The Hero Complex Film Festival always manages to put together a great line-up with fantastic speakers, and 2013 is going to be no different.  The L.A. Times has sent out a press release announcing that this year’s Hero Complex Film Festival will celebrate horror and sci-fi by screening films from and talking to John Carpenter, Frank Darabont, Chris Carter, Roland Emmerich, and Guillermo del Toro.  There will be showings of Halloween, They Live, The Mist, Pan’s Labyrinth, The Devil’s Backbone, and Independence Day.  Also, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the X-Files, the film festival will show three of the series’ best episodes uncut: “Pilot”, “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose”, and “Jose Chung’s from Outer Space”.

Hit the jump for the full press release.  The 2013 Hero Complex Film Festival runs from May 10 – 12th.

Shout Factory has become the Criterion Collection for horror and B movies, or – if nothing else – the company that Anchor Bay tried to be on DVD. Recently they’ve released some John Carpenter films that he either produced or directed. They are the magnificent They Live, with “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, Meg Foster and Keith David, and the first two Halloween sequels, Halloween II and Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Our reviews of all these Blu-rays follow after the jump.

Earlier today, the Evil Dead and Carrie reboots got into the holiday spirit with some well-timed Halloween releases.  They weren’t the only ones.  Here’s what other goodies we have:

• Dwayne Johnson in costume (ie green paint) as the Incredible Hulk
• Patton Oswalt as Doc Ock, with a DIY costume video from Adam Savage
• A motion poster for Texas Chainsaw 3D
• A short fan-made Halloween video featuring LEGO Lord of the Rings characters
• A Halloween clip from Axe Cop, featuring the voice of Nick Offerman (Parks and Recreation)
• A zombie make-up and costume featurette from Warm Bodies
• Images from Wreck-It Ralph, Les Miserables, Hotel Transylvania and more!

Hit the jump to check out our grab bag of Halloween tricks n’ treats!

Just yesterday, we brought you word about Mondo’s forthcoming pair of screenings at L.A.’s New Beverly Cinema, an event that’s being organized to benefit the Debra Hill Foundation.  At the time, we didn’t know much more than the dates, times, and special guests that Mondo had lined up for these screenings, but now—less than 24 hours later—Mondo’s shown some mercy and revealed the posters that will be selling at those screenings.  Wanna see ‘em?  Read on to get your first look at Ken Taylor’s Halloween and DKNG’s Big Top Pee-Wee, my fellow poster nerds.

This week, Mondo will travel to NYC to unveil a batch of new screenprints at this year’s New York Comic-Con.  The week after, they’re headed back home for their heavily buzzed-about Universal Monsters gallery show.  If those were the only events Mondo had scheduled this month, they’d already be delivering an incredible month for fans of the brand…but it’s just been announced that they’ve got even more tricks up their sleeve:  later this month, Mondo’s holding a pair of screenings in Los Angeles to benefit the Debra Hill Foundation, and their guest list sounds damn impressive.

Want to know everything we know about Mondo’s upcoming screenings of Big Top Pee-Wee and Halloween?  Meet me after the jump, folks.

I love it when classic movies come back to the big screen (like our Atlanta screening of The Princess Bride).  Last week, Paramount released Steven Spielberg‘s Raiders of the Lost Ark into IMAX theaters for one-week.  However, the popularity of the release has caused the studio to extend the film’s run by releasing the re-mastered version into 300 digital theaters across the United States and Canada starting today.  The re-release accompanies the film’s trip to Blu-ray, which will be released alongside the other Indiana Jones films in the Indiana Jones: The Complete Adventures box-set.  The Blu-ray box set will be available to own on September 18th.

In other re-release news, John Carpenter‘s Halloween will return to theaters for one night only on October 25th.  The screening will be preceded by a showing of Justin Beahm‘s documentary You Can’t Kill the Bogeyman: 35 Years of Halloween.  Keep an eye on this page [via Dread Central] for a list of participating theaters.  Hit the jump for the press release regarding Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Tugg, the web-based platform that allows you to bring fan-selected films to a theater near you, has added an extensive list of features from The Weinstein Company.  Now available are Best Picture Oscar-winners, The Artist and The King’s Speech, along with award-winning films Inglourious Basterds, The Reader and more.  Boasting over 500 titles, Tugg allows fans to relive the theatrical experience of some of their favorite blockbusters and sought after indies. Hit the jump to read the full press release.

There’s no debate that the following movie villains are some of the most iconic characters in cinema history, but what have they been up to since their days of inspiring fear and terror on-screen have long since passed? Does Star Wars’ Darth Vader spend his lonely nights lamenting his poor life decisions? Will A Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy Krueger ever hold a heartfelt conversation with someone who is actually conscious (and did he ever have to move off Elm St)? And whatever happened to The Shining’s Grady twins? Photographer Federico Chiesa and effects artist Carolina Trotta decided to explore the answers to these questions in a series of photos depicting our favorite villains in their twilight years. I’ve got to say, Friday the 13th’s Jason Vorhees is one of my all-time favorites and apparently he has really fallen on hard times. Hit the jump to see what cinema’s classic ne’er-do-wells have been up to.

Things aren’t looking good for a third go-around with the reimagined Halloween series. Rob Zombie kicked off the reboot with 2007’s less-than-inspiring Halloween, followed by the direct sequel Halloween II in 2009. The first film made nearly $80 million at the box office, so Halloween II was all but guaranteed given the seres’ low production cost. The second film wasn’t the big hit that the first one was, but still made a profitable $39 million. Shortly after the release of Halloween II, The Weinstein Company announced plans for a Rob Zombie-less Halloween 3D. A 2010 release was planned with My Bloody Valentine 3D director Patrick Lussier in tow, but production was ultimately delayed forcing Lussier to drop out.

The Weinstein Company got trigger happy last June and announced 2012 release dates for Halloween 3D and Scary Movie 5 despite having no script, director, actors, etc. for either film. The latter was recently pushed back, and now the October 2012 release date for Halloween 3D has been replaced with a “TBA” over at Box Office Mojo. If I had to guess, I’d say we won’t be seeing Halloween 3D anytime soon. If anything, the company might go for yet another reboot of the series, but given the tepid reaction to Halloween II I can’t imagine they’re dead set on continuing the story Zombie started.

The Ward, horror master John Carpenter’s first feature film in about 10 years, is a psychological thriller about a young woman locked in a mental institution in the 1960s. Unsure of who she is and what has happened to her, Kristen (Amber Heard) finds herself held against her will in a remote ward of a psychiatric hospital that is inhabited by four other equally disturbed young women. As Kristen quickly realizes that things are not what they seem, she learns that the hospital has dark secrets that will lead to a truth more horrifying than she ever could have imagined.

At the film’s press day, filmmaker John Carpenter did this exclusive interview with Collider, in which he talked about why he was burned out on the movie business, the appeal of working with a female ensemble, how much he loves collaborating with actors, the challenge of shooting such a self-contained story, being open to directing again, and how he feels about remakes of his previous films like They Live and Escape From New York. Check out what he had to say after the jump.

With Halloween approaching, I thought you’d like to check out some awesome sci-fi Jack-O-Lanterns.  I don’t know how many of you have tried carving a pumpkin, but it’s hard to do a straight line…let alone making an Autobot logo.  And getting Yoda, Jacob (from Twilight) and Bender from Futurama to look good is kind of amazing.  You can also see Jack-O-Lanterns from Harry Potter, Hellboy, a Cylon, Lord of the Rings, Spider-Man, Thundercats and more.  Hit the jump to check them all out.

Rob Zombie has announced that he plans to make The Lords of Salem his next project.  The film will be a thriller “set in contemporary Salem, where the inhabitants receive a demonic visit from a 300-year old coven of witches.”  Zombie will be writing the screenplay while on tour and plans to shoot the film next year.  Hit the jump to find out what made Zombie stop his plans to remake The Blob.

With his sequel to 2007′s “Halloween” remake in the can, it looks like writer/director/producer Rob Zombie’s set his sights on a new franchise: “The Blob”. This late 50′s Steve McQueen classic told the story of a red alien mass that consumes all it touches. But Zombie says he has a few ideas of his own to vary his from the original. More on Zombie’s shocking new take after the jump.