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Horror Pride Month: Enemies of Dorothy’s Ryan Fisher and Christopher Bryant

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Some of you may remember an article a few months ago about a couple of guys who were making horror parodies under the banner of Enemies of Dorothy. Their names were Ryan Leslie Fisher and Christopher Smith Bryant, and they’re making a name for themselves and their own brand of comedic horror.

Fisher and Bryant, a couple who have been together for three years, sat down to chat with me as part of iHorror’s Horror Pride Month series and, of course, the first question is when did you become horror fans?

“I’m about a 50% horror fan,” Christopher laughed. “Ryan is more 95%. I’m a horror fan but I’m not a fan of gore. I also have a huge clown phobia so when Ryan talked me into seeing IT I nearly ran out of the theater crying.”

“I grew up watching horror movies,” Ryan said. “My mom was showing us The Shining and Halloween when I was still way too young for it, probably. It’s always been a part of my life, though and I love them.”

Christopher, a stand-up comedian, and Ryan, an actor/producer/writer, were like many other artists in the wake of the 2016 Presidential election. They were frustrated and looking for the best way to express those raw emotions.

It wasn’t long before their sketch comedy group, Enemies of Dorothy, had been formed, and in just a couple of months, they would have their first viral hit with their “engagement video” for the Babadook and Pennywise.

“We fell in love with the Babadook being a gay icon because of the absurdity of it all,” Ryan explained. “It just made no sense! At the Pride parade last year there were so many Babadook signs and costumes and I told Chris I’d love to be the sketch group one day that was expected to do something like make a Babadook/Pennywise engagement video.”

It was at that point that Chris asked him why they needed to wait.

With that, they were off to the races, but neither was prepared for how much of a hit they would have on their hands.

“There’s this underlying market that we didn’t anticipate,” Christopher said. “The queer community finds something they relate to in horror. I also think it’s an escape from the real life horrors that many face just being LGBTQ today.”

The short, which has been viewed thousands of times on YouTube alone, is hilarious and it was only a matter of time before they took on another horror parody.

This time, it was the popular home invasion horror film The Strangers.

“These ideas come out of nowhere,” Ryan laughed. “You’re at a party and someone says, ‘What if it’s The Strangers but they’re worried about whether they’re being homophobic?’ And we’re like, ‘That’s just dumb enough to work!'”

“That’s where we started writing that sketch, anyways,” Christopher said. “It’s weird why there’s a lack of representation in horror because there’s a huge queer audience for them. I think a lot of it comes down to writers who are afraid to put those characters in horror situations so some of Social Justice Strangers came out of that dialogue.”

What they created was one of the best parodies I’ve ever seen as each person becomes more and more uncomfortable about what was going on in the room until they finally unite against a common foe.

The little nuggets of truth you can find in their videos is what really interests me about their work, and our conversations turned to what they found in horror that appealed to them.

“My therapist and I were talking about this recently. I have a strong sense of justice, and I think that comes from being in a minority group,” Ryan explained. “If you’re queer, you’ve been bullied at some point in your life. You can identify with characters like Carrie White. There’s that desire to see the bullies punished and there’s catharsis in that.”

“I love horror that’s really campy or that has some kind of social relevance,” Chris added. “The Babadook was horrifying because it wasn’t just a monster. It was a whole portrayal of mental illness. For so long, being gay was called a mental illness and I think in claiming the Babadook as an icon in a weird way we were re-claiming some of those years.”

The conversation became deeper still, though, when we turned to the very real horrors that are going on every day all over the world and have been for a very long time with both Fisher and Bryant really driving home the point of their love of horror and the commentary they can make while using the genre.

“Trans women are being murdered so often in this country,” Ryan pointed out. “You think about what happened to Matthew Shepard, or you hear stories about young boys in the Middle East being murdered in the streets because they’re gay. Enemies of Dorothy was born out of this political environment. Film is an art form. Even when it’s bad art, movies have the power to make us feel things so intensely so it’s the perfect medium for us to do our part to help change that political environment.”

“It’s already opened a lot of doors,” Bryant explained. “We’ll keep writing things that are politically effective to us. We’re looking for the things that aren’t being said, and we’re going to keep saying those things.”

You can find more of Chris and Ryan’s videos on the the Enemies of Dorothy Facebook Page and their YouTube channel.

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‘Blink Twice’ Trailer Presents a Thrilling Mystery in Paradise

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A new trailer for the movie formerly known as Pussy Island just dropped and it has us intrigued. Now with the more restrained title, Blink Twice, this  Zoë Kravitz-directed black comedy is set to land in theaters on August 23.

The film is packed with stars including Channing Tatum, Naomi Ackie, Alia Shawkat, Simon Rex, Adria Arjona, Haley Joel Osment, Christian Slater, Kyle MacLachlan, and Geena Davis.

The trailer feels like a Benoit Blanc mystery; people are invited to a secluded location and disappear one by one, leaving one guest to figure out what is going on.

In the film, a billionaire named Slater King (Channing Tatum) invites a waitress named Frida (Naomi Ackie) to his private island, “It’s paradise. Wild nights blend into sun-soaked days and everyone’s having a great time. No one wants this trip to end, but as strange things start to happen, Frida begins to question her reality. There is something wrong with this place. She’ll have to uncover the truth if she wants to make it out of this party alive.”

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Melissa Barrera Says ‘Scary Movie VI’ Would Be “Fun To Do”

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Melissa Barrera might literally get the last laugh on Spyglass thanks to a possible Scary Movie sequel. Paramount and Miramax are seeing the right opportunity to bring the satirical franchise back into the fold and announced last week one might be in production as early as this fall.

The last chapter of the Scary Movie franchise was almost a decade ago and since the series lampoons thematic horror movies and pop culture trends, it would seem they have a lot of content to draw ideas from, including the recent reboot of slasher series Scream.

Barerra, who starred as final girl Samantha in those movies was abruptly fired from the latest chapter, Scream VII, for expressing what Spyglass interpreted as “antisemitism,” after the actress came out in support of Palestine on social media.

Even though the drama wasn’t a laughing matter, Barrera might get her chance to parody Sam in Scary Movie VI. That is if the opportunity arises. In an interview with Inverse, the 33-year-old actress was asked about Scary Movie VI, and her reply was intriguing.

“I always loved those movies,” the actress told Inverse. “When I saw it announced, I was like, ‘Oh, that would be fun. That would be so fun to do.’”

That “fun to do” part could be construed as a passive pitch to Paramount, but that’s open to interpretation.

Just like in her franchise, Scary Movie also has a legacy cast including Anna Faris and Regina Hall. There is no word yet on if either of those actors will appear in the reboot. With or without them, Barrera is still a fan of the comedies. “They have the iconic cast that did it, so we’ll see what goes on with that. I’m just excited to see a new one,” she told the publication.

Barrera is currently celebrating the box office success of her latest horror movie Abigail.

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Thrills and Chills: Ranking ‘Radio Silence’ Films from Bloody Brilliant to Just Bloody

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Radio Silence Films

Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett, and Chad Villella are all filmmakers under the collective label called Radio Silence. Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett are the primary directors under that moniker while Villella produces.

They have gained popularity over the past 13 years and their films have become known as having a certain Radio Silence “signature.” They are bloody, usually contain monsters, and have breakneck action sequences. Their recent film Abigail exemplifies that signature and is perhaps their best film yet. They are currently working on a reboot of John Carpenter’s Escape From New York.

We thought we would go through the list of projects they have directed and rank them from high to low. None of the movies and shorts on this list are bad, they all have their merits. These rankings from top to bottom are just ones we felt showcased their talents the best.

We didn’t include movies they produced but didn’t direct.

#1. Abigail

An update to the second film on this list, Abagail is the natural progression of Radio Silence’s love of lockdown horror. It follows in pretty much the same footsteps of Ready or Not, but manages to go one better — make it about vampires.

Abigail

#2. Ready or Not

This film put Radio Silence on the map. While not as successful at the box office as some of their other films, Ready or Not proved that the team could step outside their limited anthology space and create a fun, thrilling, and bloody adventure-length film.

Ready or Not

#3. Scream (2022)

While Scream will always be a polarizing franchise, this prequel, sequel, reboot — however you want to label it showed just how much Radio Silence knew the source material. It wasn’t lazy or cash-grabby, just a good time with legendary characters we love and new ones who grew on us.

Scream (2022)

#4 Southbound (The Way Out)

Radio Silence tosses their found footage modus operandi for this anthology film. Responsible for the bookend stories, they create a terrifying world in their segment titled The Way Out, which involves strange floating beings and some sort of time loop. It’s kind of the first time we see their work without a shaky cam. If we were to rank this entire film, it would remain at this position on the list.

Southbound

#5. V/H/S (10/31/98)

The film that started it all for Radio Silence. Or should we say the segment that started it all. Even though this isn’t feature-length what they managed to do with the time they had was very good. Their chapter was titled 10/31/98, a found-footage short involving a group of friends who crash what they think is a staged exorcism only to learn not to assume things on Halloween night.

V/H/S

#6. Scream VI

Cranking up the action, moving to the big city and letting Ghostface use a shotgun, Scream VI turned the franchise on its head. Like their first one, this film played with canon and managed to win over a lot of fans in its direction, but alienated others for coloring too far outside the lines of Wes Craven’s beloved series. If any sequel was showing how the trope was going stale it was Scream VI, but it managed to squeeze some fresh blood out of this nearly three-decade mainstay.

Scream VI

#7. Devil’s Due

Fairly underrated, this, Radio Silence’s first feature-length film, is a sampler of things they took from V/H/S. It was filmed in an omnipresent found footage style, showcasing a form of possession, and features clueless men. Since this was their first bonafide major studio job it’s a wonderful touchstone to see how far they have come with their storytelling.

Devil’s Due

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