12th November 2007.

Saturday November 10 found me at the annual Dracula Society Awards for their Bram Stoker birthday dinner with guests of honour Carole Marsh and Janina Faye, two original stars of Hammer’s 1958 DRACULA. The society’s secretary, Julia Kruk, is one of my oldest friends. We were virtual next-door neighbours in my hometown of Portsmouth and our mutually shared love of horror found us going to every Hammer double bill together during our youth. Julia asked me this year to accept the Hamilton Deane award on behalf of Guillermo del Toro for PAN’S LABYRINTH the society had voted as their favourite film. Two years ago I accepted a similar accolade for Paco Plaza and ROMASANTA. I joked in my speech that I was making a habit of receiving Spanish-speaking directors’ awards. Paco had loved his specially sculpted award and I knew Guillermo would be equally impressed too.

I was well prepared. ten days ago I had been in Budapest on the set of del Toro’s HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY. Guillermo was quite exhausted from helming the massive production at the new Korda Studio complex and on locations around the Hungarian capital. But he did manage to find time to dictate some thanks that I passed on that evening, including this little snippet of info. Because he sold his stake in PAN’S LABYRINTH so he’d have the money to complete it the way he wanted, he hasn’t made a penny from its over $150 million worldwide gross. He’s made more money from THE ORPHANAGE after its record-breaking three week run in Spain alone.

I did try to film Guillermo making an acceptance speech on my camera. Unfortunately Universal Pictures wouldn’t allow that in case telling detail was captured behind him on the vast Brooklyn street set. The embargo I signed also means I cannot say any more about the July 11 release apart from it looks fabulous. How could it not with Guillermo at the helm? Another reason for going to see him was to finalise how we were going to approach my long-delayed book on his life and work. That will be done during HELLBOY II’s post-production in London. I must admit I’m looking forward to writing that as Guillermo really is one of the film industry’s absolute good guys and his story is quite an amazing one.

My last biography as many of you will know was on Dario Argento. And I went from Budapest, via the Hospital Frightfest opening, to Rome and the Italian premiere of THE THIRD MOTHER, as MOTHER OF TEARS is called there. The Halloween premiere night was a blast. Everyone was in attendance from Dario, Asia and co-star Coralina Cataldi-Tassoni to the US writers Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch and veteran special effects make-up man Sergio Stivaletti. As for my opinion of the long-awaited sequel to SUSPIRIA and INFERNO, well, it’s not the conclusion to the trilogy I was expecting. Yet it’s cleaning up at the Italian box-office. I’m still waiting for Dario to decide on a FrightFest appearance date by the way. I hope we can work it out.

In Rome I stayed in Chiara Barbo’s ultra-convenient Piazza Vittorio apartment. Chiara and her brother Giovanni helped us out at Frightfest in August. Now it’s my turn to repay the favour as I go to the Trieste Scienceplusfiction this week where they are in the control seats. So far my role is to take part in a televised discussion on Mario Bava with Joe Dante, Ruggero Deodato and Kim Newman. How easy is that going to be? But with BLACK SHEEP on the programme, doubtless I’ll be doing something with that film too. I love Trieste, always look forward to going and have a great time when I get there.

I’ll be back in time to take my place with EDEN LAKE director James Watkins (who co-wrote MY LITTLE EYE) on a discussion panel for the BFI event ‘Beautiful South’, encouraging emerging local talent. With the theme this year being ‘The Horror, The Horror’ - inspired by the wonderful Hammer DRACULA reissue - I’m there to talk about my career in the genre. You never know, I might see a short film by someone FrightFest should be paying attention to.

My upcoming movie picks? Only see BEOWULF in IMAX 3D for the best and most entertaining results. Loved Michel Gondry’s BE KIND REWIND, back on ETERNAL SUNSHINE track with Jack Black and Mos Def’s hilarious low-tech recreations of famous movies. Adored Disney’s ENCHANTED, so far the best Christmas release. THE KITE RUNNER is a movingly faithful adaptation of the best-selling book. And the funny and profound JUNO will be winning awards left right and centre. The latter is worth seeing anyway for stars Ellen Page and Jason Bateman discussing the merits of Dario Argento versus Herschell Gordon Lewis. After MOTHER OF TEARS I’m now not sure which one I’d root for most!

Until next time…