Ghoulies Started It All

by Billy Coyne
(Boston, MA)

I saw the box art of ghoulies at the age of five by accident. It sent a message into my brain where I could register to be scared or laugh at the idiocy of seeing a demon popping out of the toilet. But this image would change the rest of my life.

This isn't a netflix, but a horror addicts story.

So since the age of five I started to collect every movie I could get my hands on. Naturally VHS was the way I went, I couldn't do BETA due to not having the player, and Laserdisc I didn't know existed.

With horror movies I leaned toward the small creatures. Gremlins, Critters, Puppet Master, but I discovered Charlie Band's movies. At that time I learned about Empire International Pictures, and Full Moon. By the age of 15 I had every title Charlie Band had made up to that point.

Developing and expanding my love for these films I became a special make-up effects artist. I went to Tom Savini's program, after graduation I attended the Make-up Designory. Still having the passion to make my own little monsters and puppets.

Now I have over thirty short films under my belt, worked on a few features, and from doing FX work I've started producing, art direction, and second unit directing. But my movie collection still grows. Now I have over a thousand movies and 75% of them are horror films.

A director can ask me to make a decapitated head effect and I say "Do you want the Friday the 13 approach, or the Wrong Turn way". To me horror is something I study, I'm a horror film historian as well.

But I truly believe if it wasn't for Ghoulies, I would of become a lawyer like my father, or gotten into real estate.

All I can say is long live horror.