Montville Township High School Alumni
Montville, New Jersey (NJ)
Dante Tomaselli
Montville Township High School
Class of 1987
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DANTE'S PROFILE
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| First Name | Dante |
| Last Name | Tomaselli |
| Graduation Year | Class of 1987 |
| Gender | Male |
| Current Location | New York |
| About Me | Dante Tomaselli is an American horror film director, writer, and producer who composes electronic scores to his films in addition to producing albums of dark ambient music. His albums are as sinister and surrealist as his movies, consisting of nightmarish collages of screams, eerie laughter, sound effects, and fragments of chilling synthesizer melodies. Tomaselli was born in Paterson, New Jersey in 1969 and became infatuated with horror films as a child. He studied at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and graduated from the New York School of Visual Arts. He released his first film, Desecration, in 1999. This was followed by Horror (2002), Satan's Playground (2006), and Torture Chamber (2013). He began releasing albums of dark ambient and Halloween music in 2014, beginning with Scream in the Dark and The Doll, followed by 2015's Nightmare, 2017's Witches and 2019's Out-of-Body Experience. --Pandora 4 Feature Films DESECRATION (1999) Image Entertainment HORROR (2002) Elite Entertainment SATAN'S PLAYGROUND (2006) Anchor Bay Entertainment TORTURE CHAMBER (2013) Cinedigm 5 Albums SCREAM IN THE DARK (2014) Elite Entertainment THE DOLL (2014) Elite Entertainment NIGHTMARE (2015) Elite Entertainment WITCHES (2017) TuneCore OUT-OF-BODY EXPERIENCE (2019) TuneCore "DESECRATION is a haunting, stunningly original vision punctuated by some truly disturbing, electrifying shock sequences. Director Dante Tomaselli proves himself a passionate totally committed filmmaker with a unique vibrant personal style. Desecration serves notice that he is indeed a fierce talent to be reckoned with." --Chas Balun, Deep Red magazine (6/29/1999) "Vivid color schemes and dazzling imagery...Tomaselli has aptly crafted his short film into a full-length surrealistic nightmare voyage into the mind of a cursed Catholic boy haunted by the memory of his mother's sudden death...Desecration is easily the best European horror movie ever filmed in New Jersey. " --Rue Morgue magazine (3/19/2001) "A wildly ambitious first feature whose lush visuals belie the fact that it was shot on 16mm for a mere $150, 000...Paterson NJ-born writer-director Dante Tomaselli first made Desecration as a short film, then expanded the idea into this lavishly imagined feature...An enormously promising debut...Tomaselli's film is sometimes genuinely nightmarish - bloody nuns, killer clowns and a foggy graveyard; what a combination! - and always visually striking, not to mention genuinely creepy...Originality really does count, a lesson lost on many genre filmmakers but which Tomaselli clearly took to heart. Hollywood production designer Alfred Sole, who's thanked in the film's credits, directed and co-wrote the minor horror classic ALICE, SWEET ALICE (1978); he's Tomaselli's cousin, and Tomaselli's father, who owned a bridal store, provided ALICE, SWEET ALICE's communion dresses." --Maitland McDonagh, TV Guide (4/28/2001) "One powerfully visual experience...The screen is filled with faceless nuns, flashing lights, flying scissors and more...From the opening scenes to the end of the film, Tomaselli combines religion, horror and the supernatural to great effect...I highly recommend a viewing of Desecration." --Dvdverdict.com (5/20/2001) "HORROR managed to crawl under my skin and genuinely scare me. The film is filled with eerie characters, odd situations...chilling paintings, mind-bending images and it definitely plays by its own rules. Having seen so many horror movies, I don't scare easily. Just for that, Tomaselli deserves a pat on the back." --John Fallon, JoBlo.com (6/1/2001) "Gothic surrealism...HORROR can't help but impress with its lush, unsettling textural confidence, rich in atmosphere...distinctly ominous..." --Dennis Harvey, Variety magazine (3/23/2003) "Incorporating gothic tendencies fused with the surreal use of pop-art colors...Tomaselli mainly utilizes icy blue tones and fluorescent reds in his work, drenching the landscape with an expressionistic sense of the macabre. A swirling mist is ever-present, cutting up the landscape, allowing for unknown forces to lurk within the shadows." --Matthew Edwards, Film Out of Bounds (McFarland Book 2/11/2004) "A dreamlike and altogether unsettling movie that should capably jam some shivers into the spines of even the most hardened gore hounds - like me. If what you're looking for is an assembly-line slasher or giant monster on the loose, stick with the more traditional (i.e., familiar) fare on the video store shelf. HORROR more than anything feels like a nightmare...It's weird and unconventional, but it's also effective and scary and clearly the work of someone who knows their way around a spooky visual nightmare." --Scott Weinberg, eFilmCritic.com (5/01/2004) "The third feature from writer-director Dante Tomaselli, SATAN'S PLAYGROUND is another richly atmospheric exercise in surreal horror...The director achieves impressive overall results...complex music/ambient audio design...beautifully menacing photography...Tomaselli creates a hyper-real atmosphere of striking primal-fear images, cackling lunacy, impending doom and grotesque humor...Belying very modest means, Tomaselli has delivered a design and tech package that’s first-rate." --Dennis Harvey, Variety magazine (7/10/2005) "Like the best works of Mario Bava, Dario Argento or their young U.S. inheritor Dante Tomaselli..." --Variety magazine (3/11/2007) “Horrific ambiance...absolutely terrifying moments...Seek this out for some genuine scares that are definitely the stuff of the darkest nightmares...” --Ain't It Cool News (7/27/2012) "A deep drop into an audio-visual rabbit hole...TORTURE CHAMBER traps its audience in an environment and won't let them go...Meticulously designed...Dedicated and unrelenting with just enough set up to hook you...Those who like to get lost in cinema and allow themselves to take a trip will find this film unforgettable." --Chris Alexander, Editor-in-Chief, Fangoria magazine (5/9/2013) "SCREAM IN THE DARK sounds like it was intended to be put on at a Halloween party, to set the mood for a spooky evening, or maybe greet—and terrify—trick-or-treaters. It would also be a perfect soundtrack for any kind of haunted attraction. Tomaselli’s work is atmospheric and very moody—a horror-movie soundtrack without the horror movie. Scream in the Dark stands as a sound investment for fans of all things macabre." --Tyler Doupé, Fangoria (2/7/2014) "A deeply religious woman inflicts psychological scars on her two children...TORTURE CHAMBER builds upon the director’s earlier work and emerges as his most consistently accomplished film to date...The filmmaker has grown in style and ability while refusing to compromise his very personal and very idiosyncratic vision." --Troy Howarth, author of The Haunted World of Mario Bava (2/9/2014) "I firmly believe Dante Tomaselli is one of the most refreshing and daring voices in the world of horror cinema. Those who require a little more from their genre flicks will find something deeply unnerving and downright scary. It’s hard to put your finger on what’s giving you a serious case of the creeps, but that’s part of TORTURE CHAMBER's charm...Dante Tomaselli is a master of his craft, a director who isn’t afraid to punish your senses with uncompromising visuals and a well-crafted, multi-layered sound design." --BeyondHollywood.com (2/10/2014) "A film ripe with religious iconography that deals with possession and the power of what one’s personal upbringing and theology can suggest to influence a fragile mind...TORTURE CHAMBER is another interesting and unique entry in Tomaselli’s slow expanding filmography and it’s very much in keeping with his earlier works while at the same time allowing him to break new thematic ground. This is a well-made picture, deliberately paced and frequently surreal, challenging even, and it’s definitely worth tracking down if you have a taste for the stranger side of horror." --Ian Jane, RockShockPop.com (2/26/2014) "Magnificently eerie use of sound...TORTURE CHAMBER is a wholly original, deeply disturbing movie with an incessantly spooky atmosphere." ---The Aisle Seat (3/25/2014) "Macabre art...Set almost entirely at night and existing in a freaky dream state common to Tomaselli's first two films, TORTURE CHAMBER is another challenging, personal epic of blood and thunder...The sound mix is up to the director's usual creepy ambient standards, with rear channels often rumbling and growling enough to keep you looking over your shoulder." --Mondo Digital (4/2/2014) "Dante Tomaselli is one of the most visually striking directors working in the horror genre...TORTURE CHAMBER is a top notch production of an ambitious film that strays far from the formulaic approach found in Hollywood today. It takes its indie roots seriously by carving out its own path, surprising viewers, unsettling them and shocking them with a visceral experience that is scary and grotesque." --Dvdreview.com (4/24/2014) "Visionary director Dante Tomaselli is back with what can arguably be called his best film yet...All his trademark obsessions are on display (the inversion of religious iconography, Catholic mysticism, demonic forces hovering at the edges of the everyday and children who may or may not be spawns of the devil, all put through a seventies/Italian horror cinema blender), only here they reach a fruition and maturity that both honors what came before in his filmography and point towards an exciting new direction of growth for the director...If you are up for the weird trip and keen on the director’s personal aesthetic of low-budget surrealism, TORTURE CHAMBER offers up a quietly unsettling excursion into hell." --Justin R. Lafleur, Icons of Fright (5/20/2014) "The latest album by horror auteur Dante Tomaselli, THE DOLL is the soundtrack to his in-development film of the same name, and a creepy, nightmarish auditory journey that will immediately unsettle anyone who listens to it. The disc is catchy at times and perfectly frightful at others—a hallucinogenic trip to a dark and uncomfortable place." --Fangoria (6/3/2014) "Impressionistic...THE DOLL is an organic creature that breathes...hypnotic sound sculptures...4 Skulls." --Rue Morgue magazine (11/9/2014) "A journey into sheer madness—laced with eerie whispers, tolling bells and synth noises interrupted by creepy, unnatural laughter...Just as you begin to think you know what’s coming, NIGHTMARE pulls the rug out from underneath you." --Fangoria (2/12/2015) "For his third audio horror album, filmmaker Dante Tomaselli switches to a decidedly early eighties mode, at least with the fragments of recurring music and bass drones that evoke both slasher and thriller films with mechanical, man-slicing monsters. Crafted with the same careful attention towards fine nuances and offering a richer variety of sounds, NIGHTMARE is arguably a more ambitious project, largely because its themed nightmares – tumbling into a deep hole, a mausoleum, a lake, and more – offer discrete shocks, cold chills, and shoulder taps at every corner. The swirling sound design fully immerses the listener into a kind of watery, open-eyed stasis, where one floats and observes, but is powerless to flee, let alone wake up. There’s a greater density of material here, brilliantly edited and mastered, with each nightmare flowing into the next for 49 minutes of eerie fun." --Rue Morgue magazine (3/1/2015) "Director Dante Tomaselli has helmed an assortment of shocking, frightening, visceral, and surreal horror pictures over the past 16 years. He has also released a series of albums that are great listening for the Halloween season or for any occasion...His work speaks for itself and if you aren't familiar with it, you should most certainly seek out any of his creations." --Tyler Doupé, Syfy.com (3/19/2016) "In the same way that David Lynch sometimes takes us on non-narrative story arcs, I've always been a fan of the films of Dante Tomaselli. Stylistically, they take a cue from the Italian masters, such as Dario Argento by capturing vibrant and colorful visuals that look beautiful, but are in actuality nightmare fuel." --Rob Galluzzo, Blumhouse.com (5/25/2016) "If you're in the mood for some strange Halloween sounds that push you to the edge, check out Dante Tomaselli's CDS! Part musical landscape, and part sound effect for an unsettling mood, I am struggling to describe how unique his work is. If you've seen any of his films, you'll get it." --Derek Botelho, author of The Argento Syndrome (10/23/2016) "If there’s one thing that maestro of the macabre, Dante Tomaselli, brings to all he creates, it’s a richness of image and a real sense of fever dream aesthetics...Jonestown by way of Stonehenge...I honestly can’t recommend Witches enough, especially if you dig on the works of John Carpenter, Werewolves in Siberia, or Disasterpiece…it’s truly immersive horror-scape awesomeness." --Daniel IIIX, ThatsNotCurrent.com (3/10/2017) "Pulsing John Carpenter-esque keyboard work...Dante Tomaselli releases his fourth album of spooky, soundtrack inspired instrumental music." --Rock! Shock! Pop! (4/7/2017) "A meticulously crafted work...Tomaselli takes us on his most lurid sonic journey to date, integrating trance pulses, backbeats, and samples of berserk cult leader Jim Jones. 5 Skulls." --Rue Morgue magazine (5/2/2017) "All of Witches' 13 tracks are praiseworthy...Each cut ignites theater-of-the-mind wonderment, fear and the spiritual world by deeply boring into the psyche...Tomaselli has produced a fiendish and furtive album for fans of 'mood music' of a different kind." --Videoscope magazine (5/26/2017) "An outsider; a self-confessed loner: Horror filmmaker Dante Tomaselli is a unique anomaly in the field of American horror cinema. He is a filmmaker driven by his own artistic vision and a true independent of the underground U.S. horror scene. He has built up a resume of accomplished, surrealist horror films which have been acclaimed in the horror media...His films are made up of striking images...laced with themes such as Catholic repression...and the breakdown of the family unit...Tomaselli's films ooze with atmosphere and style and layered music that creates an audio-visual nightmare for the audience." --Matthew Edwards, Twisted Visions (McFarland Book 6/1/ 2017) "Eerie, painterly...Desecration is a low budget masterpiece of dream logic." --Maitland McDonagh, Film Comment magazine (9/11/2018) "The multi-talented Dante Tomaselli is a director, writer, producer and score-composer of all things horror and with his latest CD release of electronica titled, Out-of-Body Experience, he detaches your conscious mind from reality and sends it spiraling into an alternate state of scary-sensory ambiance. Fasten your seat belts!" --Standing Room Only (07/05/2019) "Maestro of the macabre, Dante Tomaselli returns with another full on sensory experience designed to transport your consciousness beyond the veil of reality...The spell he weaves at his sinister synths is every bit as full of arcane ambience as his monstrous motion pictures...Out-of-Body Experience has more of a melodic approach and tells a semi-autobiographical story of Tomaselli’s childhood (circa the years 1979 – 1982) in the video game saturated suburbia many of us called home in our youth...I can't recommend Out-of-Body Experience enough; this is a dark journey into a realm of nostalgia. 5 SKULLS." --Horrorfuel.com (07/04/2019) "A truly spectacular electronic tour-de-force." --Stevo Wolfson, SIYS Radio (07/04/2019) "A wave of synth noise opens Astral Projection, the first track on Dante Tomaselli’s latest collection of soundscapes. Carpenter-esque keyboards kick in, the pulse of the track quickens, and samples of a countdown mix in with computer or robot noises – and then we hear from Vincent Price. It builds in tension as the stereo pans swirl around you. Three-and-a-half-minutes later and you’re left wondering where you are – it’s seriously trippy stuff, the kind of music that takes you on a strange journey...There’s definitely the intent to conjure up the mood of late seventies/early eighties genre film scores here, and it’s done very effectively. The production values are fantastic and it’s remarkable how clean and detailed this recording sounds." --Rock! Shock! Pop! (07/22/2019) "Out-of-Body Experience is a decidedly up-tempo but no less haunting and immersive sonic journey by the filmmaker/composer/sound designer...In many ways the album is built like a winding passage...When a cue shimmers with an unusual clarity, it's as if though the wanderer has found a netted porthole in a wall, through which pulses, textures, reverb and fleeting human voices are discerned amid the dim shadow-play of misshapen figures. Before one has a moment to fully interpret the sounds, other sonic hooks pull the wanderer away and redirect one deeper into the passage." --Mark R. Hasan, KQEK.com (07/27/2019) "The composer delivers layered musical landscapes that trigger swirling imaginations amid their disco-inspired rhythms and intricate three-dimensional uneasiness...Out-of-Body Experience is a deeply absorbing and fascinating listen. Highly recommended." --Tim Ferrante, Videoscope magazine (10/12/2019) "Dante Tomaselli has made a name for himself as an indie film director with surreal, horrifying stories to tell. But more recently, he has also been gaining recognition for his electronic music. Tomaselli’s previous musical stylings include the albums Scream in the Dark, The Doll, Nightmare, and Witches. His latest offering, Out of Body Experience takes a decidedly different approach from his previous outings...The composer's usual macabre approach is combined with toe-tapping beats and dance inducing hooks...Unholy chanting, spooky noises, and eerie sound effects set to a slick, electronic beat..." --Tyler Doupé, Scream magazine (10/15/2019) "Dante Tomaselli's fifth album stays within the composer/filmmaker's realm of deeply immersive audio experiences...Each cue marks a turn or descending stairwell that reverberates with techno beats, melting synth chords and benthic drones that perpetually shape-shift and swirl across the stereo image...5 SKULLS." --Rue Morgue magazine (11/11/2019) "Among contemporary filmmakers, Dante Tomaselli stands out as Roger Corman's most direct heir, as his cheaply made cinematic tales of terror consistently rely on stylized set pieces to produce creepy atmosphere." --André Loiselle, Theatricality in the Horror Film (Anthem Press book 11/14/2019) "For nearly two decades, New Jersey-born horror multi-hyphenate Dante Tomaselli has been steadily creating a series of surreal, expressionist horror films that favor bizarre imagery and all-encompassing sound designs over traditional narrative structure and logic. That's what makes them so special: pictures like HORROR, DESECRATION and TORTURE CHAMBER. And when Tomaselli isn't making movies, he's releasing movies-for-your-mind with his unique conceptual aural-horror CD's like THE DOLL, WITCHES, NIGHTMARE and OUT-OF-BODY EXPERIENCE." ...(read more) |
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Recent Class of 1987 Reunions
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25 year! Boy, we're getting old!
Invited Classes: 1987
Date: Jul 14, 2012
Description: Montville Class of '87! I just got an Alumni update that this is a reunion year for us. TWENTY FIVE YEARS! OMG we are ge...(read more)