Mark A Nobles

Forbidden Horrors Mark A Nobles

Forbidden Horrors is a Southern Gothic/Fantasy set during the golden age of local television that utilizes poverty row horror and exploitation films from the 30's, 40's and 50's as life lessons for the characters in a sleepy little Texas town."When the night falls... when the shadows become deep and black... the silent pall of evil settles on the earth. Who dares to search... who dares to see what walks in the night? If you dare...welcome to NIGHTMARE." Thus began the frightful Kronos's weekly midnight ramble inviting the brave and foolhardy for a stroll through the vaults of long forgotten and forbidden horrors classics. An introduction young Nick Root knows by heart. When Nick decides to run away from home he runs to the place he knows and loves best, the television studios of KFJZ where Nightmare is filmed. But on this night, the horror is especially gruesome and unknown, even to Kronos, for tonight the dreadfulness begins with a visit from the bowdlerizer Willimena Breen, a sharp tongued, iron fisted enforcer of the Motion Picture Production Code. The date is July 13th, a Friday, 1962 and the time is midnight and Nightmare is about to air live to less than 50,000 people in a mid sized city in America's heartland. Kronos's only purpose is to show 1934's Maniac, give the viewers a good, campy scare and go home. However, the tag line for the film, "He menaced women with his weird desires!" is enough to send Breen into a fit of self-righteous rage. Storming onto the live set Breen shrieks objections directly quoted from the MPPC. Kronos and the entire Nightmare crew stop down, frozen by the commands of the termagant. Only one can save them and let the film be screened. Edgar Ulmer, stalwart independent film maker, film historian and lone voice of reason.