video nasties – The Reprobate

Remembering Martin Barker

The academic author who was the lone defender of Video Nasties and horror comics during the cultural dark ages of the 1980s.

Half beast, half man, all wild entertainment – the oddest of the video nasties is an experience to savour.

The newly-made follow-up – in name only – to the notorious Video Nasty is not an enjoyable viewing experience.

Found Footage, modern horror and 1970s British sleaze are explored in our latest video interview.

Continuing our occasional series charting the history of vintage VHS (and Betamax) promotional brochures.

The things that scare the living daylights out of us as kids are often unpredictable and coincide with our sudden awareness of our own mortality.

A pair of VHS catalogues from one of the more prolific indie distributors of the 1980s.

The moral panic over the malign influence of Squid Game and the theoretical dangers of children wearing ‘dangerous’ fancy dress.

The pioneering home video offerings from one of Britain’s biggest entertainment companies.

Proving fiction to be stranger than truth, the story of the outrageous Shockumentary that spawned sequels, imitations and a cultural phenomenon.

Mainstream film critics are the last people who we should be listening to about anything.

Scaring people into compliance and controlling the public discussion with vaguely worded laws and campaigns of moral panic.

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