Behind the Scenes Awesomeness: Gremlins (1984) and Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990)

Gremlins (1984) and Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990) director Joe Dante

Christopher Lee and Joe Dante

Producer Steven Spielberg and Director Joe Dante 

Special Effects Genius Rick Baker manipulating one of his creations for Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990)

Corey Feldman, Zach Galligan and Joe Dante

Joe Dante and Rick Baker

Citizen Toxie: Toxic Avenger IV (2000)

Title: Citizen Toxie: Toxic Avenger IV (2000)

Director: Lloyd Kaufman

Cast: David Mattey, Heidi Sjursen, Joe Fleishaker, Paul Kyrmse

Review:

There’s a couple of films out there that pride themselves in trying to be as offensive as humanly possible. Films like John Water’s Pink Flamingos (1972), Trey Parker’s Team America: World Police (2004), Frank Henenlotter’s Frankenhooker (1990) or the Sacha Baron Cohen double whammy Borat (2006) and Bruno (2009). And I get these directors, offending people makes money. In ‘Kiss and Make-UP’ Gene Simmons autobiography, Simmons says that “the formula for success is to offend as many people as possible”; which as we all know has worked wonders for Simmons personal bank account. So I get it, Lloyd Kaufman is doing just that with his Troma films; he’s been doing it for years with movies like Class of Nuke ‘Em High (1986) and Tromeo & Juliet (1996). I’ve yet to see a Troma film that didn’t have some sort of shock element to it. Still, I have to say that with Citizen Toxie: Toxic Avenger IV he really tried his hardest.

Lloyd Kaufman proudly standing next to his creation: The Toxic Avenger!

On this film The Toxic Avenger has to stop a group of terrorist freakazoids called ‘The Diaper Mafia’ basically, these are a bunch of guys who dress up as babies and take over a school of disabled children or as it is called in the film ‘Tromaville School for the Very Special’. Unfortunately, Toxie isn’t very successful in saving the school from the explosion and so the bomb blows up and creates and opens a dimensional rift! Toxie is then transported to Amortville, which is basically an alternate version of Tromaville, and Toxies alternate doppelganger called ‘The Noxious Offender’ is trapped in Tromaville. Will Toxie return to Tromaville in time to stop The Noxious Offender from destroying his life and reputation as New Jersey’s First Superhero?

I have to admit I enjoyed all previous entries in The Toxic Avenger franchise. Parts I through III were actually pretty ‘decent’ comedies. Yeah they wanted to shock and offend, but they were pretty entertaining Z level films. And yeah, there’s a Z level in moviedom for me, it’s reserved for movies such as these; ultra low budget films that are decidedly cheap. Funniest part is that Part IV starts with an opening sequence that says that all previous sequels were not the real sequels: this is the real sequel! Right from the get go, I was giggling with this one. Kaufman knows these movies are bottom rung material, but Kaufman doesn’t give a flippin’ fuck about anything, he just wants to shock and sell some dvd’s while doing it. And he achieves it. I mean, how he could not shock with material such as this! The script literally feels as if it was ‘written’ by someone high on super crack! These films are stupid and offensive but you can rest assured that something funny, or morbid or completely gross will happen at some point, in fact, every five minutes.

Don’t believe me? Okay, try this one on for size: Toxie takes one of the members of the diaper mafia and literally pushes his head out his butthole! Then the guy exclaims “Now I got my head up my ass!” And that’s just for starters…at some point we meet a collection Tromaville superheroes and one of them is called Dolphin Man, and it’s literally a man with a dolphin head! Toxie’s sidekick is an obese dude known as ‘Lard Ass’! Toxie and Noxie both impregnate the same woman, and you can see both babies fighting inside of their mothers womb! I mean, seriously folks, these are not the craziest things you will see in this movie. Not enough for you? Then maybe you’ll enjoy catching cameos from Eli Roth, Ron Jeremy, Cory Feldman, James Gunn and even Lemmy from Motorhead! Hell, even GOD makes an appearance; and guess what? God is a drunken midget on this one! That’s how completely nuts this movie is! And he’s surrounded by whores! Still not enough? Even Stan Lee narrates part of the film! And another thing that made this one more fun to watch then it had any right to be was the inclusion of ‘Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D.’ which by the way is another one of Lloyd Kaufman’s crazy creations. He’s an NYPD cop who dresses up in Kabuki style make up to fight crime! It was amusing to see Toxie going up against an evil alternate version of Sgt. Kabukiman. I immediately felt the need to watch Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D. (1990), so expect a review for that one soon.

Sgt. Kabukiman vs. The Toxic Avenger!

My only real problem with this film is that technically it looks worse then previous sequels, cheaper somehow. I think it’s because the previous films were shot on actual film, and that helps the film look a bit better. Strange that previous efforts look more polished then this one, I guess it makes sense, the budget for this one was a mere 500,000, while parts one and two shared a budget of 2.3 million. Still, even with its budgetary limitations, it’s commendable that Kaufman manages to turn in a bad film that amuses. These films are in my opinion bad taste in its purest form, but damn it, it’s entertaining just for that. I cannot bring myself to say that this is a good movie, because it isn’t! But I would be lying if I didn’t say that I wasn’t shocked or giggling or cringing or turning my face away very five seconds. My advice with this one is, if you are offended easily, do not watch this one! If on the other hand you enjoy the thrill of watching some unbelievably raunchy, sacrilegious jokes and grossly irreverent situations then by all means indulge on this slice of Tromaville low brow entertainment. At the very least you won’t be bored.

Rating: 2 out of 5 

Corey Feldman cameos!

    

What I Ended Up Seeing on Halloween Night: Tales from the Crypt Presents: Bordello of Blood (1996)

Title: Bordello of Blood (1996)

Director: Gilbert Albert

Cast: Christopher Sarandon, Dennis Miller, Angie Everhart, Erika Eleniak, Corey Feldman, William Sadler, Phil Fondacaro, John Kassir

Review:

I am still on a Halloween hangover as I type this. This past Halloween 2010 was all sorts of fun. I ended up being a movie DJ at a local pub, and so I screened three gory horror classics under the light of the full moon: Evil Dead 2 (1987), Demons (1985), and Dead Alive (1992). I loved doing that because people who would normally never see Evil Dead 2 were like “what movie is that?! I need to rent it!” At home, after all the Halloween parties were over and done with, I ended up watching Tales from the Crypt Presents: Bordello of Blood on Halloween night. I wasn’t planning too, but that’s what I ended up watching and I’m glad that’s the movie I ended up seeing because it was actually the perfect kind of film to watch on Halloween Night. It was fun, fast paced and cheesy in that way that only a Tales from the Crypt movie could be. I remember being disappointed with this one when it first came out, but for some reason I found myself enjoying it a whole lot more this time around. Maybe now I’m old enough to get Dennis Millers hilariously sarcastic dialogue?

This film starts out with this midget version of Indiana Jones (played by Phil Fondacaro) searching for this magical key that can be used to fight evil. Actually, if you’ve seen the first Tales from the Crypt movie (Demon Knight) then you’ll recognize it as the key that they used in that movie to stop the demons; the key that has Jesus Christ’s blood inside of it. So anyhows, Midget Indy wants to become a vampire and so he is going to resurrect Lilith, Queen of All Vampires so she can do him the favor. He figures he can keep her in check by using the key. Unfortunately, Queen Lillith ends up being a lot cleverer then Midget Indy expected, and so Lillith escapes and opens up a whore house or “a house inhabited by whores” as Dennis Miller puts it at one point. What happens is, teenagers get invited to this whorehouse to have the “best goddamn pussy in the whole goddamn world!” and once they get to the whorehouse, they become victims to the whores, who are all hot vampire vixens. Dennis Miller investigates and tries to stop them.

Lillith, immediately after resurrection

So just why did I enjoy this movie so much you may ask? Well, for starters, the dialog is freaking hilarious! Dennis Millers wise ass puns, and sarcastic one liners truly make Bordello of Blood a whole lot funnier then it should be. I mean, this dude had me cracking up all through out the film. Miller reportedly regrets having worked on this film. I guess that’s why the one liners are so bitter and dry at times, I mean, you could tell Miller was making fun of these situations and dialog. I’m pretty sure Miller adlibbed a lot of the dialog on this film. How much of smart ass is Miller on this movie? Well, in one scene when he is speaking to his ex wife over the phone and he tells her: “You’re reminding me why being married to you drove me to the brink of homosexuality!” Then, after that, he tells her “I gotta go, Fuck You!” In another scene he tells Lillith, the vampire queen: “I’m not going to tell you those aren’t the Breasts of the Century, but I’m just not digging the owner, so why don’t you put those away, you’re not my type!” And that stinging dialog continues all through out the movie, non stop, all the time. Like a machine gun of insults and sarcasm. Miller definitely makes this movie infinitely more watchable.

But that’s not all ladies and gentlemen; there is more goodness to be had with this movie. Chris Sarandon, he who played Jerry Dandridge the head vampire in Fright Night (1985) plays a preacher on this film. A money hogging show man, who knows how to play the crowd and give them what they want over at the ole church. Which reminds me, you can chalk Bordello of Blood up on the list of films that criticize the commercialism of religion, and the showmanship of the whole thing. The spectacles some of these preachers put up in order to gather the attention of a crowd! Chris Sarandon plays one such character who goes by the name of Reverend J.C. Chris’s Sarandon’s J.C. is a preacher who puts on a stage show and reads all his lines from a teleprompter, the fakest and most obscene type of preacher. He doesn’t share his fortune with his followers or his henchmen, he has them all working for “the lord” for free. J.C.’s most loyal follower is played by Erika Eleniak who was made famous during her run on Baywatch. On Bordello of Blood she plays this squeaky clean Christian girl whom Dennis Miller gets the hots for. Unfortunately, as he puts it at one point “Old time Christianity and sex don’t mix! Unless you’re a catholic priest” So we got a great cast on this film. We even get Corey Feldman playing a vampire on this one which was kind of funny since he had played a vampire hunter a couple of years before Bordello in The Lost Boys (1988).

"Oh Shit! This Sucks!"  Corey Feldman, playing a vampire

To make things even better, this movie is not afraid to show its gore! Bordello of Blood is merciless on this department! Lillith and her clan of vampire whores have no problem with ripping a guys heart out with their bare hands and sucking the blood from the still beating heart! I mean, you can actually see that sequence on the film. But there’s lots more gooey fun in the film. Bordello of Blood didn’t pussy out from showing the gore like a lot of today’s horror movies do. Even the SAW movies use quick cuts and editing as a way to not show too much. Not so in Bordello of blood, a film that wears its gore proudly. One gloriously entertaining gore sequence has the good guys breaking into the whorehouse with their holy water guns. It’s a vampire massacre with hot vampire vixens exploding into a ball of fire as holy water is squirted on them! And it all happens to the tune of the extremely appropriate “Ballroom Blitz”! Gory, gory fun, it reminds me of why I love horror movies and why I enjoy that very unique Tales from the Crypt style of humor.

The gore is plentiful in Bordello of Blood

Another thing: as I was watching Bordello of Blood an idea popped into my head. This movie is about a coven of vampires that run a whore house and use the bordello as a way to lure in their victims. Immediately, another film from the eighties with a similar premise popped into mind: Vamp (1986). I immediately thought that Bordello (staying true to its vampire themes) fed off of the premise presented in Vamp and took it on a more comedic/adventurous route. It might have also fed from Robert Rodriguez’s and Quentin Tarantino’s From Dusk Till Dawn (1996). I find it curious that Bordello was released mere months after from From Dusk Till Dawn. It made me think that it was filmed to capitalize on the success of From Dusk Till Dawn. You know what I’m talking about. It was one of those things in which different studios release similarly themed movies, hoping that the success of one film will rub off on the other. Kind of like how when The Abyss (1989) was being made, other studios went on to make similar underwater themed films like Leviathan (1989) and Deep Star Six (1989) because they smelled success with the underwater sci-fi movie. The Abyss had a huge buzz around it at the time. Same thing with Bordello. Whatever the purpose for making a film like Bordello was to its producers, I think the results were extremely entertaining. And also, I guess Vamp though not the most amazing vampire movie to come out of the 80s, was more influential then I had thought!  

Angie Everheart plays Lillith, the vampire with the "Breasts of the Century"

This film was to be the second film in a trilogy of Tales from the Crypt films, unfortunately, Bordello of Blood tanked so atrociously at the box office that the third feature was not marketed as a Tales from the Crypt film. It was simply released under the title “Ritual”. But since even Ritual tanked at the box office, it was then released straight to DVD as part of the Tales from the Crypt franchise. They even filmed two book end scenes involving the Crypt Keeper as a way to make Ritual a part of the whole Tales from the Crypt thing. But, truth is that no Tales from the Crypt fan really considers Ritual as part of the first two films. Ritual is seen as a standalone Tales from the Crypt film. Why did Bordello tank? Why was it such a box office bomb? Why the sudden loss of interest in the franchise? Maybe folks had already had their fill of the Crypt Keeper after 7 seasons on HBO and two movies. Maybe it was deemed too gory or too anti-religious? I think it was the potent mix of all these elements. Still, Bordello of Blood remains an entertaining and funny horror gem left to be enjoyed by those willing to give it a chance on DVD.

Rating: 4 out of 5

William Sadler here playing The Mummy, appeared on the first episode of the HBO show and on both Tales from the Crypt movies! Way to go William Sadler!



Lost Boys: The Thirst (2010)

Title: Lost Boys: The Thirst (2010)

Director: Dario Piana

Cast: Corey Feldman, Jamison Newlander

Review:

Finally, a Lost Boys sequel that’s worth a damn! Okay, first off, I’ve never been happy with the fact that they decided to take the straight to video route with these sequels because in my book Joel Schumacher’s original film was one of the best vampire films to come out of the 80’s, and it deserved a proper theatrically released sequel. But who’s to understand the logic behind a studio executives mind? All they care about is money anyways! In my opinion, they were sitting in a gold mine and they missed the opportunity to go theatrical with this series of films. The first of these straight to dvd sequels was called Lost Boys: The Tribe (2008). It was a terrible film! I watched it but I didn’t enjoy it. At all. The main reason being that it was step by step the same movie as the first, only badly developed. It went through the same exact plot points, only with different characters. Also, The Tribe didn’t have any of the original films sense of humor. In my eyes, Lost Boys: The Tribe took itself too seriously. So when I heard about this third one being made, I didn’t really care about the idea. Until I saw the previews for it that is. There was something there, a spark of promise to it. Could this new Lost Boys film have recovered some of the coolness that the original had?

The Meanest, The Baddest! Awesome Monster Bashers!

On Lost Boys: The Thirst we meet with The Frog Brothers again, Edgar and Alan Frog. Together, these two brothers ran a comic book shop during the day and slayed vampires during the night. They were Santa Carla’s own vampire hunters, dedicated to a higher purpose; they were fighters of truth, justice and the American way. Problem is, they broke up. They haven’t been the “Frog Brothers” in a long time. Alan was turned into a vampire and is now in hiding, and into taxidermy. Edgar (Corey Feldman) needs his brothers’ help in stopping a group of vampires that’s going around selling vampire blood, making kids think it’s a new designer drug. At the same time, the vampires have kidnapped the brother of a famous novelist, who is the author of a series of vampire novels that glamorize vampirism, ala Twilight. The author has decided to get the help of the famous Frog Brothers to try and rescue her brother and stop these vampires from spreading vampirism across the land. Will the Frog Brothers reunite once again? Will they again be the “meanest and baddest” vampire slayers in town?

The Frog Bros. are back in town!

The filmmakers got something right when they got together to make this one. You see, they aimed their guns on making a film that oozes nostalgia. The filmmakers really aimed to please fans of the original film, and if you ask me they succeeded. A lot of things in this film feel familiar, for example Edgar is still hanging around comic book stores selling old back issues of comics. The theme from The Lost Boys “Cry Little Sister” is played through out this awesome sequence where these vampires jump out of a plane in mid-flight. By the way, dont know what it is, but I never get tired of that song! Alan Frog is back, and he is played by Jamison Newlander, the same guy who played the character in the first film, it was great to see them get the same guy. It wouldn’t have felt right other wise. But most important of all, is the fact that the film got its comedy back. The original wasn’t a flat out comedy, but the way the characters talked, the one liners the Frog Brothers spewed was part of what made the first film entertaining. It felt like one big comic book of a vampire movie, which essentially the first film is. This new sequel got that comic book groove back and I loved that about it.

The film pays it's respects to Corey Haim.

Lost Boys: The Thirst feels like it exists within the same universe as the originals. It quotes the original film a lot, at times repeating lines of dialog; it even has flashbacks to the original. The film also took its time to remember Corey Haim, who recently passed away. It was touching to see him remembered through a series of flashbacks that show Corey Haim slaying vampires along with The Frog Brothers. It was a touching way of remembering Corey Haim’s better days, when drugs had not ravaged his life. Taking this in consideration, it makes perfect sense that this time around The Frog Brothers are trying to stop a coven of vampires that are selling a new “drug” to kids. A drug that is made up of vampires blood. In a way, the film takes a stance against the thing that killed Corey Haim, and pays homage to him. I thought that gave the movie lots of heart as well.

The Corey's during their glory days

But not all is nostalgia in The Thirst. The film does present us with a new thing or two. For example, the kid that gets kidnapped and that The Frog Brothers have to rescue is the brother of a famous novelist who’s responsible for a series of books that glamorize vampirism. I love this element of the movie because it gave the filmmakers a chance to voice how real horror fans feel about the whole Twilight phenomenon. “Your books suck! They glamorize vampires, and there is nothing glamorous about vampires!” says Edgar at one point in the film. Well, said! I almost applauded after Edgar said that to the novelist! There’s this other thing about a ‘celebrity blogger’ that had me laughing as well! They take a hit at blogging on this movie! Hee-la-rious! Then, another “modern” touch that the film has is that the vampires put on these rave parties with techno music, where everybody dances the night away high and drunk. And top less. Speaking of top less babes, there’s lots of them on this film as well! There is also a rival vampire hunter that tags along with Edgar, who is shooting a reality show as he tags along. That character was making fun of ‘reality shows’ and how fake they are. As Edgar states it “Everything is staged in those reality shows!” Was Feldman commenting on his experiences making his reality show ‘The Two Coreys’? More than likely!

Speaking of the vampires in this film, they all look like a bunch of heavy metal dudes and dudettes from the eighties, which is awesome of course because it goes with the vibe of the original film. It makes you feel like your right back in Santa Carla amongst the biker vampires of the first film. The vamps in this movie are the anti-twilight, nothing glamorous about them at all. These guys are vicious! Dangerous! They feed like animals, shredding apart their victims’ throats with their fangs. There is this one awesome feeding sequence where the first thing that came to mind was: “wow! Vampires finally got their balls back!” Yeah! So I loved that about this movie as well.

"Lady, your books suck! Did you ever read 'Destroy all Vampires?' Now theres a book!"

The best thing about this one though? Seeing The Frog Brothers back in action! Corey Feldman knows this character inside and out by now, he really has the character fleshed out. The guy speaks in grunts, and whenever he doesn’t like something he grunts like a frog. I like how Feldman has embraced this character and made it his own. The Frog Brothers have a couple of friends to help them along the way this time around, they aren’t completely alone. They have this guy that makes weapons for them. Edgar goes visit him to stock up on weapons, before hitting the vampires den. The scene felt like something right out of a James Bond movie or Escape from New York with Edgar stocking up on a bunch of cool vampire killing weapons like ultraviolet guns and holy water grenade launchers. The finale of the film is filled with non stop vampire slaying, right smack in the middle of a rave.

So what we got here ladies and gentlemen is a step up from the second film. Does this one feel good simply because the last one sucked? I don’t think so, because had this film been the second film, I would have been extremely happy with it. I mean, these straight to video movies might not be theatrical releases, but if done right, they can be entertaining. Any fan of the original Lost Boys film will feel a familiarity and respect towards the original with The Thirst that will keep you happy and satisfied. Corey Feldman plays a great Edgar, and it’s great to see both Frog Brothers back in action! Not a bad sequel at all. It is fun, it doesn’t take itself too seriously, and has vicious vampires that spit on the whole Twilight phenomenon. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind seeing another Lost Boys film of which I’m sure we will see more of. Especially when we take in consideration the cliffhanger that this one ends with. Of course this isnt the best movie ever made, it's not groundbreaking or anything. Yes, its formulaic, yes it is similar to the original in many ways, but for a straight to dvd sequel? It's damn fun.

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5