Celebrate Halloween the 4DK way!

Halloween movie lists have become a staple of the season. But one has to admit that there's a numbing amount of overlap between them. I mean, does one really need to cram that much Vincent Price into their cinematic diet all in one go? In response, I have called shenanigans, emerged from my sharecropper's cabin, stumbled down the hill and perched myself in front of the community center's battered old Mac to do something that I should have done long ago. Below is a list of movies that, if you can find them, will guarantee you a Halloween like no other. (Please note that, where I have provided links, they are, in most cases, to unsubtitled versions of the films).

Da Khwar Lasme Spogmay, aka Cat Beast (Pakistan, 1997)

One owes it to oneself to, at least once in their life, watch a Pashto language horror film... before, of course, solemnly swearing to never watch one again. Da Khwar Lasme Spogmay has all of the hallmarks: fat ladies twerking in wet spandex; sound effects that are as incongruous as they are deafeningly loud, men with echoplexed voices pointing and shouting at each other. The works.
READ MY REVIEW

Plenilunio (Uruguay, 1993)

Uruguay comes through with that rarest of cinematic unicorns: a shot-on-video horror film that is not only well directed, well written and well acted, but that also provides some genuine scares... even if its creature effects are as ridiculous as they come. READ MY REVIEW

Sumpah Orang Minyak (Singapore, 1958)

The Oily Man rises from the swamp of Southeast Asian folklore to provide, not only an exotic addition to the usual cast of Halloween creatures, but also a simple and easy costume idea. All you need is a body stocking and a can of STP. READ MY REVIEW

WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE

The Savage Hunt of King Stakh (USSR, 1979)

Highly recommended by a well-meaning idiot who wrote: "The Savage Hunt of King Stakh luxuriates in gothic atmosphere, putting it in good company with the Italian thrillers of Margheritti et al, the AIP Poe films, and Hammer’s horror friendly take on The Hound of the Baskervilles. In contrast to those, however, it also boasts elements of stark modernism." READ MY REVIEW

WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE

Nyi Blorong, aka Snake Queen (Indonesia, 1982)

What would a 4DK Halloween be without Suzzanna, the queen of Indonesian horror?--here seen in one of her most iconic roles. As an added bonus for the ladies, we also get a shirtless Barry Prima. READ MY REVIEW

WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE

Ghost of Guts Eater (Thailand, 1973)

What? You say your seasonal gallery of ghouls does not include an entrails-trailing flying severed head? You are obviously a racist. READ MY REVIEW

WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE

Haram Alek, aka Ismail Yassin meets Frankenstein (Egypt, 1954)

That oldies-loving friend of yours insisting on yet another Halloween viewing of Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein? Why not shake things up and switch it out with this charming Egyptian remake. READ MY REVIEW

WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE (WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES!)

And finally...

Pyasa Shaitan (India, 1995)

...if watching all of the above in short order does not completely blow your mind,  here you go. The film that will spontaneously give you the ability to spout "WHAT THE FUCK, JOGINDER?" in flawless Tamil, not to mention every other language spoken by sane, decent minded human beings. READ MY REVIEW

WATCH IT ON YOUTUBE

Ago Go 67 (Singapore, 1967)

Produced by Shaw Brothers’ Malay language division under the direction of Nordin Arshad, Ago Go 67 hews very closely to the template set by the “pop review” type of films -- think Pop Gear, or Live It Up -- that were issuing from Britain during the 1960s. We have two nice kids with dreams of stardom, disapproving parents, slick music biz types, rapturously frugging teens, and just enough of a plot to serve as the connective tissue between numerous musical vignettes showcasing the hitmakers of the day. Along the way, those of us at a historical remove from the proceedings are given an alluring snapshot of the Beatles-influenced “Pop Yeh Yeh” movement that was exploding throughout Malaysia at the time.

A pair of popular young actor/singers, Aziz Jaafar and Noor Azizah, respectively play Johari (“Joe”) and Fauziah. Fauziah works days as a shop girl while Joe labors at a stable with the film’s designated comic relief (S. Shamsuddin). Nights, however, are dedicated to practicing with their beat band, Dendang Perindu, which, as far as I can tell is played by the real beat band Dendang Perindu. This is an activity that Fauziah must keep secret from her father (Ahmad Nisfu), a blustering martinet who loudly objects to the youth music of today with all of its “yeah yeah yeah”-ing and such.

While visiting a recording studio at the behest of a slick music biz type played by Kuswadinata, the kids in Dendang Perindu see a poster for a record company sponsored talent showcase that just may provide them with their big break. It just may also provide Ago Go 67 with the opportunity to present us with a string of musical performance clips by groups with names like Wan Intan & The Mods, M. Ishak & The Young Lovers, The Terwellos, and Orchid Abdullah & Les Coasters.

One thing I learned from Ago Go 67 and my subsequent research into same is that the associations between Malay singers of the era and the bands who backed them up were somewhat transient, with the bands allying themselves with whichever performer opportunity -- or, perhaps, commerce -- smiled upon at that moment. For example, The Rythmn Boys (sic), who here perform behind singer S. Mariam, became one of the most in-demand backing bands on the scene after winning a Dave Clark 5-themed talent contest, and resultantly played with a number of different artists. On the other hand, singer Siti Zaitan, who here beams through an energetic, spy-themed number called “Alam Seni” to the accompaniment of The Hornets, was more often seen fronting a group called The Firebirds.

Despite defying the prevailing naming conventions, Denang Perindu ultimately win the big break we all knew they would. Unfortunately, as fate and the necessities of three act structure would have it, it is at this time that Fauziah’s father chooses to bring the hammer down on her musical activities. Providing further complications is Salvia, the singer for a rival band played by Malay sexpot Norma Zainal, who has unwelcome romantic designs on young Joe. It will take all of the moxie these teens can muster to make sure everything is set right before the producers of Ago Go 67 see fit to cram in another uninterrupted block of musical performances.

While Fausiah’s dad getting all het up about it provides the required note of generational tension, there really isn’t much on display in Ago Go 67 that one could imagine presenting much of a threat to the status quo. The music is undeniably fun, but lightweight, perfectly suited to the wholesome prancing of the clean cut -- shirts and ties for the boys, knee-length jumpers for the girls -- dancers who shimmy along to it.

This is not to say that there are not standouts among the performances, the aforementioned Siti Zaitan & The Hornets’ being one of them. On top of that, there is the striking androgyny and haunting vocal of D4-Ever singer, D. Hatta, who came into this world as one Mohamed Hatta Abdul Wahab (like some Jewish American singers, Malaysian singers of the era appear to have had a tendency to deracinate their stage names -- perhaps understandably, given the racial strife that was gripping the country at the time). Elsewhere, Blind singer S. Jibeng -- rather than presenting himself as an inspirational figure like so many other disabled artists before him -- seems to be milking his condition for pathos with the song “Nasib si Butah” (“Blind Luck”). He starts by dropping his cane onto the set from off-screen, as if by accident, and then scrambles for it pathetically on the ground before launching into his mournful tune.

Also bearing mention is the level of musicianship on display in Ago Go 67, which is exceptional. The guitar instrumentals of groups like The Ventures and, especially, The Shadows had an enormous influence on Southeast Asian beat groups at the time, which is given ample testament here. The resulting prominence of busy and interweaving, melodic guitar lines requires a lot of lightning-fingered picking on the part of the axemen in these groups. This, of course, does not cancel out the need for showmanship, as equal prominence is given to lots of choreographed guitar moves -- a tradition that I wish would return, along with the practice, abundantly in evidence here, of conveniently labeling the kick drum head with the band’s name.

A movie like Ago Go 67 was likely seen as a quick money maker for Shaw, unworthy of the vibrant color lavished on its Hong Kong productions. Still, one can’t help wishing it could have been otherwise, especially when considering the delightfully campy designs of the individualized sets on which each group performs. All of the staple elements of 1960s variety show mise-en-scène are on view: the giant musical notes, the ascending rampways to nowhere, the stylized street scenes populated by bizarre, human-like effigies. Singer S. Mariam is even provided with an on-stage vanity table and mirror, into which she stares with delicious melancholy, like a Malay Francoise Hardy, brushing her hair absently as the intro plays. What M. Ishak & The Young Lovers did to have their song, “Menari Go-Go”, simply performed in someone’s backyard, I’ll never know.

I think it goes without saying that Ago Go 67, which is currently available in its entirety on YouTube, is a real treat for fans of world pop, be it of the musical or cinematic variety. If, like me, you are a fan of both, it is a little slice of heaven. As an added bonus, the steadfastly formulaic nature of its plot renders subtitles completely unnecessary. For example, I don’t need to speak Malay to know what Fauziah’s father, predictably humbled and chagrined at the film’s end, is saying. Darn those crazy kids!

Sumpah Pontianak, aka Blood of Pontianak (Malaysia, 1958)

Hey, pretties, why slaver over the next Karloff or Lugosi retrospective when you can build your own alternative pantheon of classic monsters from those based on Southeast Asian folklore, such as the Oily Man, The Krasue, or Sumpah Pontianak's Pontianak. Shy away from them, if you must (go ahead; they're gross!), but I will not stop singing their praises until they have their own cartoon on Nick and appear on every lunchbox and pencil case in the country.

Sumpah Pontianak is the third and final in a series of films based on the female vampire the Pontianak that were produced during the late 50s by Cathay Keris, the Singapore branch of Hong Kong's powerhouse Cathay studio. Sadly, the first two films in the series appear to be lost, but someone clearly loved Sumpah Pontianak, as the existing VCD sports a handsome transfer, albeit an unsubtitled one. Well, you can't win 'em all. Fortunately, I had the omni-lingual Braineater's fine review to steer me into safe waters.

First off, kids, I don't know how to put this, but the Pontianak is one butt fugly woman. In this case, she is Comel, as played by Maria Menando, who has a hunchback and a pretty smashed up face, like you're looking at it pressed to the windshield of a speeding car.  The earlier films tell how she is a foundling raised by a sorcerer who, as an adult, avails herself of a beauty potion. It works, turning her into a beautiful woman, but, as a turd in that particular box of bon bons, she also gets turned into a Pontianak -- or vam-pyre, as some would call it. Apparently at the end of the second film, she is deprived of her ability to transform herself by some yokels who stick a nail in her neck.

Sumpah Pontianak begins with a bereft Comel wandering the countryside and encountering her share of hostile bumpkins, who, as bumpkins are won't, are quick to raise up torches and form mobs against anything that smells of the other worldly. Among these hicks are a young comedian Mat Sentul, ten years before his appearance as Mat Bond, and a singing satay vendor played by a guy named Wahid Satay, who, according to Braineater, specialized in playing singing satay vendors. This might make Sumpah Pontianak an effective appetite stimulant if you like satay, or are a ghost with hole.

Comel's pathetic pleas for understanding fall on deaf ears, as the villagers waste no time in stringing her up and tormenting her in various ways. Meanwhile, a host of supernatural happenings take place: The satay gang are spooked by a ghost voice that sounds like Yolandi from Die Antwoord and Comel raises a male vampire by removing a stake from its heart. At the same time, a series of  exsanguination murders makes it all the more difficult for Comel to convince the gentry that she means them no harm.

Directed, like the other two films in the series, by B. Narayan Rao, Sumpah Pontianal gains a rich, classic horror movie atmosphere from the moody contributions of cinematographer Laurie Friedman (one of a number of Western names among the crew) and composer Zubir Said, who has to compete with a lot of jaunty songs about satay. Also benefiting the production greatly is the heartrending performance by Maria Menado, who really drives home the tragic dimensions so typical of these cursed females spirits in Southeast Asian folklore.

Parallel to Comel's woeful sojourn, we see that of her beautiful young daughter Maria (Salmah Amad), who is wandering the forest in search of her long thought dead mother. This, like a ghost busting Goldilocks, puts her constantly in peril at the claws of a Puff n' Stuff like menagerie of plush beasties, first and foremost a combination toucan/salamander thing that is apparently the real culprit of the murders. Others include an unfriendly Cro-magnon man and, finally, a furry, bat-like gentleman who whisks her away to his lair. Fortunately, some hapless tormentors accidentally remove the nail from Comel's neck, allowing her to transform into the hag-faced Pontianak and take off into the night sky like Superman. What follows is a rousing kaiju battle that is somewhat at odds with the sombre tone of pretty much all that has proceeded it.

So, in the end, the Pontianak series offers poor Comel some karmic reward for all of the hardship she's endured -- no longer a shunned outsider, but an unorthodox superhero whose powers separate her from the rest of small minded society by degrees of, not just ghastliness, but of virtue and bravery. That cartoon on Nick may not be too far off.

Sumpah Orang Minyak (Singapore, 1958)

To the degree that any Western cult film enthusiast is aware of the legendary Malaysian bogey known as the Oily Man, it is most likely by way of the Shaw Brothers' 1976 Hong Kong production The Oily Maniac. In that film, Mighty Peking Man director Meng Hua Ho wrestled that eerie bit of folklore into something resembling a more sleazy take on Swamp Thing, complete with about 500% more nudity and sexual violence. As a result, those familiar with that film might be taken aback by the comparatively delicate take on the subject found in Sumpah Orang Minyak (in English: Curse of the Oily Man), an earlier take on the legend from Shaw's Malaysian division.

Of course, much of the difference between Sumpah Orang Minyak and The Oily Maniac arises from the span of nearly twenty years that separates them. But I also can't help thinking that the former's relatively stately and reverent tone is in part the result of it being a star vehicle for the phenomenally beloved Malaysian performer P. Ramlee, who also scripted and directed the film, in addition to contributing to its music. As mentioned in my review of his Tiga Abdul, Ramlee's stature as a musician, actor and all around creative dynamo has lead to him becoming an institution in his homeland, and, as such, it's inevitable that any monster picture in which he took the titular role would be handled with more gravitas than your average tossed-off creature feature.

Here Ramlee plays Si Bongkok, a disfigured hunchback who, as the movie begins, finds shelter with a kindly old batik maker (Idris Home) after being pursued through the night by a gang of village ruffians. It is not long before the batik maker sees that within Si Bongkok's pitifully twisted form rests a gentle and artistic soul, and not much longer before his business is booming thanks to the hunchback's beguiling designs. None of this, sadly, changes the fact that Si Bongkok is routinely brutalized and tormented by the people of the village, especially by the aforementioned gang of ruffians, who are lead by a surly character named Buyong (Salleh Kamil).

Things come to a tragic head when Afida (Sri Dewi), the comely young daughter of the village elder, stands up to Buyong in Si Bongkok's defense. A town festival at which Si Bongkok attempts to show his gratitude to Afida by presenting her with a portrait he's painted only proves to be another occasion for Buyong and his cronies to further humiliate him. Fleeing the scene, a tearful Si Bongkok loudly curses his fate, ushering in a long sequence that's a captivating triumph of naive surrealism and grade school theatrics.

Si Bongkok's lamentations reach the ears of the Orang Bunyan, who, in Malaysian folklore, are a race of forest dwelling supernatural beings akin to elves or goblins. As the sky opens above him, the Orang Bunyan Princess arrives in a kind of land-faring boat to usher him back to her world. There, the King of the Orang Bunyan presents him with a great book from which he can choose one wish. Si Bongkok chooses to be beautiful, and the King asks in exchange that he vow never to succumb to wrath or boastfulness in his dealings with his fellow humans, otherwise the deal will be off. From there, it's only a matter of Si Bongkok bathing in a magic fountain, after which he emerges as beloved Malaysian musician and performer P. Ramlee, who, to be honest, is a pretty good looking dude.

Of course, once back in the human world, it quickly proves too difficult for the now easy-on-the-eyes Si Bongkok to resist telling the assembled villagers to go fuck themselves. In the ensuing melee, Afida is killed by a blade intended by Buyong for Si Bongkok, and after a dramatic, storm-swept brawl, Si Bongkok kills Buyong in retaliation. Not surprisingly, this is seen as a violation by the Orang Bunyan King, who quickly appears to render Si Bongkok invisible for eternity. Fortunately, good old Satan, always eager to set things back on an even keel, is also on hand, and appears before Si Bongkok, offering him a magic ring that will make him once again manifest to the eye. And once that ring is donned, Old Scratch proves good on his word -- though what Si Bongkok becomes visible as is the cursed Oily Man.

The Oily Man, in both tale and popular representation, is pretty much everything that his name advertises: a guy covered from head to toe in greasy black oil. Though -- in Sumpah Orang Minyak, at least -- he is also shown to have the ability to dematerialize, walk through walls, and leap great distances. As far as his visual presentation in the film, it's simply a matter of dressing P. Ramlee in a black body stocking and painting his entire head with some kind of shiny black makeup. Thankfully, the Orang Minyak, much like the Krasue, is another one of those Southeast Asian cryptids so bizarre and unsettling in its very conception that not even the most threadbare representation can completely rob it of its capacity to disturb.

Needless to say, Satan's gift of turning Si Bongkok into an objectionable mass of grease does not come without a price attached, and that price is that Si Bongkok must now rape 21 virgins within the course of the next week -- a task which Si Bongkok sets too with surprising alacrity (perhaps in part due to the fact that the film has exhausted about eighty percent of its running time before introducing its titular menace). This sets up an interesting contrast to the markedly more lurid Oily Maniac, in which the Oily Man is depicted as an avenger -- rather than a perpetrator -- of wrongs, including rape. However, it is Ramlee's version that hews more faithfully to the fabled original, a figure so identified with rape that it appears that even real world rapists have on occasion adopted his guise.

Certainly, Si Bongkok's final rampage does much to undo the goodwill that Ramlee has, over the course of Sumpah Orang Minyak's preceding 90 minutes or so, worked to generate toward him as a Quasimodo-like tragic figure. But I also suspect that Ramlee did so in fealty to his source material. While The Oily Maniac, like any exploitation film worthy of the name, strove to, wherever possible, turn that source into grist for evermore gratuitous displays of tits and blood, Ramlee uses it as a means by which to express his respect for the culture that both created it and, to some extent, him.

And, in this, Ramlee does a fine job, creating a film that is at once dense with mournful atmosphere and elevated by moments of dreamlike lyricism. (His musical contributions -- which, as in Tiga Abdul, are engaging and beautifully sung -- add a lot in this last regard.) In the end, Sumpah Orang Minyak may not provide the course thrills of The Oily Maniac, or the visceral jolt of other Southeast Asian horrors, but, in its own hypnotic way, it offers rich rewards nonetheless.

Tiga Abdul (Singapore, 1964)

In Malaysia, P. Ramlee is an artist of such stature that he has buildings and institutions named after him. (Yes, that’s plural.) He rose to fame as a singer, instrumentalist and composer in the late 40s, and soon thereafter became a star on the big screen, adding the title of director to his formidable list of accomplishments only a few years later. Tiga Abdul (or 3 Abdul), a 1964 production from Shaw Brothers’ Singapore-based Malay language division, shows the multi-talented Ramlee firing on all cylinders, acting both as star and director, while also singing musical numbers that he wrote and arranged for the film.

Based on a traditional Malaysian folk tale, Tiga Abdul takes place in a fictionalized, time warp version of Istanbul in which everyone wears 60s fashions but still buys and sells slaves in the marketplace. It also appears that every man to a one is born with a fez attached to his head. With most films in which a guy in a fez appears, you could describe him as “the guy in the fez” and feel secure in the fact that you have been sufficiently specific, but, in the case of Tiga Abdul, that would quite literally describe every man who appears on screen. Furthermore, while none of these men are shown sleeping, I imagine that, if they were, they would be shown wearing their fezzes. If not, someone might notice that they are all Southeast Asians who look nothing like what most people’s idea of a Turk is. In short, Tiga Abdul is a real fez-apalooza.

Anyway, Ramlee plays Abdul Wahub, the youngest of three brothers who are all named Abdul. As the film repeatedly strives at the expense of all subtlety to make clear, Abdul Wahub is the most virtuous of these brothers. He is even at one point shown wearing a white suit in conspicuous contrast to their black ones, and is frequently shown gazing reprovingly upon their greedy, hedonistic antics. This, while effective in establishing the elder Abduls’ lack of character, also comes very close to presenting Abdul Wahub as being a bit on the priggish and judgmental side. Luckily, this impression is mitigated somewhat when we see Abdul Wahub in the music shop he owns, rocking out on the electric guitar with pseudo-Turkey’s fez-wearing version of The Ventures.

When the wealthy father of the three Abduls dies suddenly without leaving a will, the eldest Abdul, the grasping Abdul Wahab (Haji Mahadi), is charged with divvying up the inheritance. Likely because Abdul Wahub so obviously hates both of them -- but also because they only care about money, while Abdul Wahub cares about art and music and feelings and stuff -- elders Abdul Wahab and Abdul Wahib decide to split the old man’s vast fortune in assets between themselves, leaving Abdul Wahub with only their father’s rundown mansion to show for his filial devotion. At the same time, an unscrupulous friend of their father’s, Sadiq Segaraga (Ahmad Nisfu), has his own eyes on their newly acquired fortune, and goes about getting it by launching his three attractive young daughters at the boys like so many hourglass-shaped, heat seeking missiles.

Both of the older brothers fall head over heels for these lovelies, and it is only the upright Abdul Wahub who sees through the ruse, greeting the tentative advances of Segaraga’s youngest daughter Ghasidah (Sarimah) with nothing but scorn and reproach. Soon the elder Abduls are approaching Segaraga and asking for his daughters’ hands in marriage, at which point the old trickster springs a contract on them that stipulates that, once married, they can never become angry, lest they should forfeit all of their assets to him and be sold into slavery. The two foolishly agree to this and the wedding bells chime, after which Segaraga, quite unsurprisingly, makes a dedicated project out of making them angry as quickly as possible, first by denying them access to anything beyond the aroma of food, and then by barring them from the marital bed. Needless to say, it’s not long before both are penniless, on the block, and up for sale to the highest bidder.

Soon after these developments, Abdul Wahub’s father appears before him in a dream. Now, given that Tiga Abdul has up to this point exhibited a sort of fanciful, fairytale-like quality, you might expect this to be the juncture at which things will take something of an enchanted turn. But in a surprising display of fiscal pragmatism from beyond the grave, Dad instead advises young Abdul to pay a visit to his lawyer. Once done, this lawyer informs Abdul that, in addition to the domestically accrued fortune that his brothers have inherited, Abdul’s dad also had overseas assets of even greater value, all of which now belongs to him. Now having reaped the huge cash rewards that are the right of any truly virtuous soul, Abdul Wahub sets about scheming with the lawyer to win his brothers’ freedom and deliver Segaraga his comeuppance.

This scheme will ultimately involve Abdul Wahub marrying Ghasidah and then turning her father’s contract back against him, with the result that, after a number of convolutions, Abdul Wahub will end up turning just about everyone involved into human chattel and buying them for himself. He does this, of course, so that he may ultimately free them, but that doesn’t mean that he won’t first harangue them about how awful they all are. The moral of this age old fable, then? Don’t fuck with Abdul Wahub. Oh, and? Get a lawyer. It’s basically like a folk tale written by an MBA.

As a lead actor, Ramlee gives a competent but not especially charismatic or developed performance here, which leads me to suspect that, for his audience, his status as a beloved entertainer was a suitable stand-in for characterization. His musical contributions to the film, furthermore, give us a solid idea of just why that might have been. Ramlee’s tunes are so beguilingly melodious, and the manner in which he sings them –- when he takes the lead -- so relaxed and agreeable, that I ended up wishing that he hadn’t been so stingy with them, and had instead provided more than just the three. Especially nice is the film’s devilishly catchy theme tune, which is sung by Ramlee’s wife, Salmah “Saloma” Ismail, who appears in the delightfully modish credit sequence, singing in split screen as the titles roll beside her.

As for his talents behind the camera, Ramlee’s directorial hand is not flamboyant, but sufficient to get the story told on the obviously limited budget that was provided. It’s becoming apparent to me that the Shaw Brothers’ Malaysian productions were nowhere near as lush as those made by their Hong Kong division, and here that’s evidenced by the preponderance of tiny sets and matte painted exteriors. Still, Ramlee nonetheless manages to conjure up an appropriate, “fractured fairytale” atmosphere with the application of mischievous cartoonish touches and visual puns. He also keeps things moving along briskly, which, with a story that is so obviously grinding inevitably toward a predetermined and all-too-clearly visible moral conclusion, is always welcome.

Having seen Tiga Abdul’s toe-tapping credit sequence on YouTube, I was hoping for it to be an exotic 60s time capsule with cultish appeal. What I got instead was a modest little film with an abundance of quirky charm. I also, as mentioned above, got more fezzes than I could ever have imagined seeing onscreen at one time. Nonetheless, you don’t have to be an enthusiast of traditional Ottoman headwear in order to appreciate this one. But if you are, you might want to wear yours for the viewing.