I went through a real serial-killer kick several years ago. Fascinated by the subject and the fact that these monsters had almost celebrity-like status, I read up on a ton of these bad boys and predominantly focussed on the more ‘popular’ killers. (Ted Bundy, Richard Ramirez, Ed Gein, Albert Fish, and of course – John Wayne Gacy.

One book that proved to be one of the most fascinating reads was Jason Moss’ ‘The Last Victim’. Jason Moss was a college student who became obsessed with notorious serial killer John Wayne Gacy. He began corresponding with Gacy in 1994, the last year of the killer’s life. Moss eventually met Gacy on Death Row and even narrowly escaped an attack by him.

This book is now coming to our screens as ‘Dear Mr. Gacy’. Prodcued by ‘Monster’ producer Clark Peterson and starring William Forsythe as Gacy, while Jesse Moss, who stars in Paramount’s current release The Uninvited, will play the role of Jason Moss.

“I’m always pretty big into research, particularly a character like Mr. Gacy,” Forsythe says.

Gacy was convicted in 1980 of killing 33 boys and young men, many of whom he buried in the crawlspace under his house. He was executed in 1994, and the movie tells the story of American college student Jason Moss (played by Vancouver actor Jesse Moss), who struck up a correspondence with the killer and eventually visited him in prison.

“It’s important to me to take the walk, to actually go on the journey from childhood, to see and understand what it is that (makes) a person,” says Forsythe. “Sometimes it’s physical. I remember when I played Al Capone (on the TV series The Untouchables) I did the same thing. I found myself going to the place where he grew up and I would take the walk. Suddenly I would discover, wow, halfway beteween here and his school was where all the gangsters hung out. When he was 11 he saw that along the way.

“I did a similar journey here, I got to know quite a few people who knew John from various angles. One gentlemen in particular has been an amazing resource to me, to really understand the other side of John, which apparently was as real as the horrible side. What I discovered was that everyone liked John, he was one of the most personable — he was the life of the party. The gentleman that I got to meet knew him as a child, he was his best friend from the when they were about nine or 10 all the way through. His name was Barry Boschelli, a tremendous help in showing me the other side of John. That makes it even more monstrous in a way.

Director Svetozar Ristovski (Mirage) will make his English-language debut with the feature, directing from a script by Kellie Madison. Gordon Yang is also producing, while Tom Berry and Madison are exec producing.

Living at home with his parents in suburbia, attending college and dating his girlfriend, Jason lives a seemingly normal life. An overachiever, he’s always looking for a challenge and some new way to excel. As part of a school assignment, he sends a carefully crafted letter to John Gacy in prison, portraying himself as a vulnerable kid. Gacy, suspicious at first, puts Moss through harrowing emotional tests via phone and letters, before surrendering his trust to him. What follows is a twisted psychological game of cat and mouse between two master manipulators, in which Jason’s life is turned upside down and Gacy discovers new dimensions within himself. When Gacy invites Jason for a private meeting with him in prison, Jason accepts, but the boy could never have imagined what was about to take place behind the doors of a maximum security prison.

Sadly in 2006 however Moss committed suicide after he had gained a somewhat celebrity status. The book that he wrote was often described as a real life ‘Silence of the Lambs’.

Dressed as the Grim Reaper and holding signs that read, "Alannah Hill: Designer Of Death" members of People For The Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) Asia-Pacific protested outside the flagship Alannah Hill Boutique in Melbourne this afternoon. The protest follows PETA’s attempts to talk to Hill about her decision to include fur in her designs.

China, where much of Hill’s fur is believed to originate, has no laws to protect animals on fur farms and is now the world’s leading fur exporter. Video footage from PETA’s undercover investigation shows workers who slam foxes and raccoon dogs to the ground before skinning the animals. After the are skinned, some of the animals are shown panting and blinking. Millions of cats and dogs in China are strangled of bled to death for their fur, which is often mislabelled before it is exported, leading consumers to believe that it comes from other species.

"When it comes to terror and death, even the Grim Reaper has nothing on Alannah Hill", says PETA Asia-Pacific’s Ward Young. "With so many fashionable and warm alternatives available, there’s simply no excuse for wearing fur."

You might have gone down the rabbit hole before. But never with a guide quite as attuned to the fantastic as Tim Burton.

Those who have grown curiouser and curiouser about what the offbeat reinventor of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory might conjure up in his version of Alice in Wonderland can feast their eyes on this array of concept art and publicity images, due to hang in movie theaters this week to promote the March 5, 2010, release.

“It has been Burton-ized” is how producer Richard Zanuck describes the director’s vision of the Lewis Carroll classic. Many elements are familiar, from the enigmatic Caterpillar (Alan Rickman) to the fierce Jabberwock (Christopher Lee). But none has been presented in this sort of visually surreal fashion.

“We finished shooting in December after only 40 days,” Zanuck says. Now the live action is being merged with CG animation and motion-capture creatures, and then transferred into 3-D.

The traditional tale has been freshened with a blast of girl power, courtesy of writer Linda Woolverton (Beauty and the Beast). Alice, 17, attends a party at a Victorian estate only to find she is about to be proposed to in front of hundreds of snooty society types. Off she runs, following a white rabbit into a hole and ending up in Wonderland, a place she visited 10 years before yet doesn’t remember.

Among those who welcome her back is the Mad Hatter, a part tailor-made for Johnny Depp as he collaborates with Burton for the seventh time. “This character is off his rocker,” Zanuck says.

Aussie actress Mia Wasikowska, 19, best known for HBO’s In Treatment, has the coveted title role. “There is something real, honest and sincere about her,” Zanuck says. “She’s not a typical Hollywood starlet.”

There is the usual Burton-esque ghoulishness (Helena Bonham Carter’s Red Queen, whose favorite retort is “Off with their heads,” has a moat filled with bobbing noggins), but Zanuck assures most kids can handle it. “The book itself is pretty dark,” he notes. “This is for little people and people who read it when they were little 50 years ago.”

By Susan Wloszczyna, USA TODAY

“Off his rocker”: Johnny Depp concocts another memorably trippy character as the Mad Hatter. Besides his Carrot Top mop, Depp undergoes a transformation with the addition of enlarged eyes tinted yellow. “He is so much fun and so nutty, I can’t imagine anyone else doing it,” says producer Richard Zanuck. The actor also employs an accent that Zanuck can only describe as indescribable.

Wonderland was a peaceful kingdom until the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) took power. “The creatures are ready to revolt and waiting for Alice to help them,” says Zanuck. Bonham Carter has a digitally enhanced swelled head to play the domineering crimson ruler, who likes nothing better than to scream “Off with their heads!”

The White Queen (Anne Hathaway), who was overthrown by her sister, “is beautiful but over the top. She doesn’t walk. She floats. She’s very eccentric,” Zanuck says.

‘Little Britain’s’ Matt Lucas as Tweedledee & Tweedeldum.

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I was in a weird headspace all week and it was a last minute decision to attend tonight’s gig. Still, I didn’t want to pass up on the opportunity of photographing an energetic and dynamically visual international rock act – so I tried to psyche myself, get to the gig and get the job done.

Photographing at the HiFi Bar can be one of two things… easy or difficult. I prefer shooting outside of the (sometimes) designated photo-pit. The pit is incredibly deep and more often than not – all you get is shots looking up the performer’s nose and all sorts of weird angles.

Tonight, the pit wasn’t in use and if you get to the show early enough, there is a really sweet spot on either side of the stage which allows for a fantastic vantage point and good angles to work with.

As stated from the outset, I wasn’t in the right frame of mind tonight and I found myself struggling to “get in the zone” as I like to call it.

“Getting in the zone” is when you and the camera are one. It is a time when you know you have captured the money shot just as you are about to press down on the shutter release. It happens rarely, but when it does… it is an amazing feeling and you know you’ve got gold even before chimping it up through the viewfinder.

Alas, tonight… I wasn’t in tune. Usually out of a shoot of over 400 shots, I usually find 60 – 70 that I feel are worthy of uploading. I could probably cull it down further, but on average that is the quota I usually release to the general populace.

Tonight, even though I shot for the duration of the band’s set – I could only come up with a handful to publish.

Still, it was a fun night and even though I was dodging the push and shove, I did come away with some shots that I thought were pretty good.

There was a great crowd in attendance. Most looking like the band themselves… a gothic-post-apocalyptic blackfest that looked like extras from Tarantino’s ‘From Dusk Till Dawn’. Coulda had some fun just shooting the crowd tonight but I planted myself at what I dub the ‘HiFi Bar Sweet Spot’ and waited for the band to hit the stage.

The 69 Eyes attacked the stage like the preverbal bats-outta-hell. Looking lean, mean and certainly out for the kill as they blasted through a surprisingly catchy hard rocking set of the best Vampiric rock the cold climes of Helsinki could spew forth!

View the complete set at the Visceral Industry.

We’re looking for a few outstanding individuals. You want a piece of this blog to call your own? Here is your chance! Take it! Grab it by the horns and stamp your mark on it. If you wanna do album reviews or gig reviews or books or whatever-da-fuck you want… then talk to me! Shoot me an email and you too can become a senior droog of all things Dogmatic!

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I first got to witness Manson back in February of 1997. Pretty much an unknown in Australia but that is still a gig which I have many fond memories of. They’ve toured these shores several times since then and for all the newbie Mansonites, here’s your chance to see them live – albeit a shadow of the greatness they once exuded back in the ‘Antichrist Superstar’ era!

To co-incide with the release of his seventh album ‘The High End of Low’, Manson will return to Australia this October for a run of dates that take in Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.

The tour will see the return of legendary bassist Twiggy Ramirez. Chris Vrenna, Andy Gerold and Ginger Fish will complete the line-up.

Tickets go on sale Friday June 19. Presale starts midday Wednesday June 17, and finishes 5pm Thursday June 18.

• 5 Oct: Challenge Stadium, WA
• 7 Oct: Thebarton Theatre, SA
• 10 Oct: Festival Hall, VIC
• 14 Oct: Hordern Pavilion, NSW
• 17 Oct: Brisbane Entertainment Centre,QLD

With a stench of marijuana and beer in the air, I met up with my contact at Billboard as I had been requested to shoot some shots of Death Metal legends Mortal Angel half an hour before they were to hit the stage.

I waited at the foot of a stairwell which led to the band’s dressing-room and took in the sights, sounds and smells around me. Scantily clad young lasses tugged at my ‘Media’ pass around my neck and with my camera hanging over my shoulder, I was mistaken for someone in the band’s entourage several times.

“No, I’m not with the band…”

I wonder if I didn’t have that piece of plastic around my neck, would anyone even bother to talk to me?

After waiting around like some groupie fan-boy for half-an-hour, I was beginning to feel uncomfortable so I texted the venue’s manager to see if the backstage shoot was still on. He rushed back up to the band and they had decided they weren’t going to shoot any shots backstage.

By this point in time, with the band about to hit the stage any second, it was going to be incredibly hard for me to squeeze through the crowd to get to the photo-pit. Instead, I was walked through the backstage area, onto the stage which had the curtain drawn.

I could hear the crowd chanting ‘Morbid Angel! Morbid Angel! Morbid Angel!’ over and over. The band had assumed position on-stage and were about to unleash hell. (I shoulda taken a shot right here… but I didn’t think quick enough!)

I was taken to the front of the stage, the curtain drawn slightly so I could jump down into the photo-pit. This was kind of exciting as the crowd cheered loudly when the curtain was drawn but instead of the band… they got me instead! Heh!

I jumped down. Got the gear ready and within seconds, the curtain fell and hell was indeed unleashed!

Again, all I had was three songs and for the duration of those three songs, the band was bathed in that sickly red frontlight which makes taking a decent shot all the more difficult.

Sigh!

Still, there was absolutely nothing I could do about the red lights so I endeavored to take as best a shot as I could under trying conditions.

The stage-divers don’t usually rear their heads and boots till about half-way through a set, but tonight, they were there in earnest – so I tried to dodge them as well.

View more here…