Bad Taste (1988)

NOVEMBER 16, 2007

GENRE: ALIEN, COMEDIC, INDEPENDENT
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

One of the biggest surprise titles on the Chilling Classics set was Peter Jackson’s debut film, Bad Taste. Like Deep Red and Driller Killer, it was a film I had actually heard of before, due to the fact that it wasn’t a public domain curio from the 70s like 90% of the rest of the set. And unlike some of the other “big” titles, it didn’t seem to be an edited version. Obviously I didn’t remember much about the film from the one time I saw it back in high school, or else it wouldn’t be eligible for HMAD, but the gore seems intact and the running time is the same, so it’s kind of puzzling how Mill Creek got it on there.

Anyway, like Evil Dead, the film is a bittersweet reminder of how inventive and borderline insane the director used to be. Considering that the opening weekend of any of the LOTR films outgrossed all of Jackson’s other films combined, I think it’s not entirely ignorant to assume I was one of the few people going to see Fellowship because I was a fan of the director, not the material. While not bad films by any means, I much prefer his older films, where the inventiveness and sheer joy of making films was evident in every frame. Sure, the visuals in LOTR and Kong (a film I barely like at all) are spectacular, but it will always be more impressed with a well done beheading in a film that cost about 10 grand than to see a dinosaur in a film that cost 200 million.

Yet it took 15 years for him to win an Oscar.

Plus the movie is just funny as hell. The scene where Jackson (playing one of two characters) runs around shooting aliens while making the "Neh-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh" sound of the machine gun is just one of many laugh out loud moments. There’s also some brilliant off-kilter dialogue (“We are here to fight any threat to the planet Earth!” “And the moon!”). And of course, the gore itself is played for laughs. Fuck, the movie is just fun. As was Dead Alive, and Meet The Feebles, and even The Frighteners for the most part. Then he got all serious and shit. Now he’s making a movie about a 13 year old who gets raped and killed. Yay?

Like Raimi, it’s great that Jackson has gone from making movies with his friends, for no money, in his backyard, to helming the biggest films of all time, but damn if I don’t wish they would return to their roots every now and then. His Hollywood films might be flawless in their presentation, but technical wizardry doesn’t replace genuine inventiveness.

I should also note that this marks the end of my affair with the Chilling Classics set. You may notice that there are only 45 reviews for the 50 film set, but Medusa, Death Rage, War of the Robots, and The Bloody Brood contain no horror elements whatsoever, and Legend of Big Foot is a documentary. I think it was just about exactly one year ago that I bought this little bundle of joy, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t kind of sad to be ‘retiring’ it. While nothing ever matched the amazingness of Cathy’s Curse or Scream Bloody Murder (two of the earliest selections), I was almost always entertained with the films, if not for the intended reasons, and I can only hope that Horror Classics and Decrepit Crypt sets will live up to Chilling’s legacy.

RIP Chilling Classics: November 2006 – November 2007.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Slashed Dreams

NOVEMBER 1, 2007

GENRE: CRAP, HORROR? RAPE-REVENGE (?)
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

At long last, October is over! I can go back to the standard, sane, simple, single movie a day. And I feel even better about that when my daily movie is as bad as Slashed Dreams (aka Sunburst), because I don’t want to run the risk of watching another film that might turn out as boring and pointless as this one for at least another 24 hrs or so.

This may be the most plodding movie I have ever seen in my life (certainly the worst offender for HMAD). LITERALLY nothing happens in the film. Except a rape. Nice, huh? We watch 2 folks sort of shuffle about the woods for nearly an hour (swimming, frolicking, eating...) before a couple of rednecks harass them (very tamely. One of them actually seems borderline nice). Later on, they come back and hit the guy a few times and rape the girl (at least, we are told as much. It’s sort of hard to tell if the guy is raping her or just hugging her. It’s certainly the least graphic rape scene ever committed to film, so it’s got that going for it at least). Then Robert Englund shows up, philosophizes about tea, the boyfriend tries to fight the rednecks, who both run away, and then the good guys go swimming. The end. I’m not exaggerating, that’s the movie. No one dies or gets jailed for their crimes. And the heroes barely seem perturbed afterwards. You could almost remove the scenes with the rednecks entirely and the film would just seem like the filmed version of a Bartledanian novel.

As you can probably tell from that image, the movie was very poorly retitled from Sunburst sometime after Nightmare on Elm St, in order to try to give the film some cash-in value. Usually, this is certainly fine by me, but there are two problems with it this time: 1. It’s the most obvious retitling I’ve ever seen (I wish I could convey how ridiculous the little zooming animation on the green box looks), and 2. Englund’s not even the fucking bad guy! He’s some hippie (heh, OK, so maybe he is). He doesn’t even show up until the final 10 minutes or so. Come on now. This is purely a scam.

His reaction to being told that his friend was raped is pretty astounding. The boyfriend tells him she was raped, and Englund doesn’t ask anything like “Who did it?” or “Where did they go?” He just asks if the girl has had some food yet. At first, I thought he was going to turn out to be an even worse villain, but no, he just makes her some tea and then more or less exits the film again.

This movie is also stuffed with folk music, most by a female singer. Terrifying, perhaps, but not in the intentional way. If not for my little safety that I can qualify (and judge, unfortunately for the filmmakers) a film as horror if it is presented as such (which being on the Chilling Classics set certainly does), I wouldn’t even consider it horror at all. It’s Rape-NonRevenge, a thankfully obscure genre that is hopefully comprised entirely of this one sorry film.

Oh there’s a bear scene too.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Man In The Attic (1953)

OCTOBER 30, 2007

GENRE: SERIAL KILLER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Earlier this year, I saw Zodiac, and it remains one of the year’s best films (any genre). Like Jack the Ripper, the Zodiac was never caught (at least, not AS the Zodiac; dude might have been picked up for cross-dressing or something), and the film’s strict following of the facts meant that the film sort of lacked a conclusion in the typical way (i.e. the bad guy getting caught). Yet for some reason, many of the Ripper films I have seen, including Man In The Attic, can’t be content with sticking to the facts, instead they're always making up a guy and presenting him as the killer.

In theory, there’s nothing wrong with it, but it gives the film a sort of pointlessness. Why use the backdrop of one of the most intriguing serial killer stories in history in order to tell a fairly drab story about a creepy guy who turns out to be the killer (in a film that offers no other suspects to boot)? It hardly makes for gripping cinema, nor does it really teach you anything about the real case. It was Zodiac’s greatest achievement to focus on the obsession of the police/reporters working the case; we didn’t resolve the killer’s storyline (at least not concretely), but we got a great character study out of the deal.

That’s not the case here, as other than Jack Palance as the killer, no one has much to do other than be typical stereotypes (a cop, a maid, a beautiful damsel, the worrisome innkeeper...). The only thing that really makes the film stick out is the ridiculous couple of dance numbers (plus a song straight out of any random musical), which slow the film down and serve no real purpose. Also, the score sounds suspiciously like the theme to the original Star Trek.

In the end, the film (which is a remake of a Hitchcock film called The Lodger, which I assume is much better) is really only worth watching for two things: 1. A young Jack Palance (my first encounter with him was in Batman I think – and it’s sort of upsetting to see him so young yet have the exact same voice), and 2. The idea presented by a few characters that Jack the Ripper couldn’t be married, because no married man would do such heinous things to women. I don’t know if this was a legitimate theory proposed at the time, but if so, it’s pretty damn amazing. If you ask me, ONLY a man who has suffered through marriage could be capable of such things. But to each his own!

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

October Extras # 23 - Horrors Of Spider Island

OCTOBER 23, 2007

GENRE: MONSTER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)
LAST SEEN: 2004 (MST3K)

Like Track of the Moon Beast, today’s October Extra is one I have both seen several times and never at all. Horrors Of Spider Island was one of the last episodes in the 10th (final) season of Mystery Science Theater, and it was a particular gem. With some exceptions, the monster movies always seemed to be funnier than the crime dramas and such that a lot of episodes featured (the one with Angel’s Revenge is a completely unfunny episode, as is the 10th season’s odd German version of Hamlet).

Of course, again, this one’s funny even without Mike, Servo, and Crow riffing along with the film. But it also contains several important lessons/tidbits that any living man, woman, or child should know:

• If you need to foreshadow a plane’s engine burning out, cut to a giant wave.
• The quickest way to Singapore from Los Angeles is through New York.
• When bitten by a giant spider, men will turn into hairier men.
• If a plane catches fire and loses radio contact, there is “no reason to fear the worst”.
• Excessive heat will cause men to cheat on their girlfriends.
• Whistling can keep women from being afraid.
• Models have to be told when to sleep and drink.

Actually that last one might really be true.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

October Extras #11 - Track Of The Moon Beast

OCTOBER 11, 2007

GENRE: HERO KILLER, MONSTER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)
LAST SEEN: APRIL 2006 (MST3K)

Here’s a unique choice for an October extra... a movie I have seen both a dozen times, and never. As the movie choice for one of my all time favorite MST3k episodes, Track of the Moon Beast is one I am quite familiar with (moreso than any other October Extra thus far!), yet I had never seen it without Mike and the bots talking over it. Nor have I ever seen the bottom right corner of the film.

The great thing about this movie is how funny it is even without them. It’s such a goofy, yet earnest movie, I laughed just as often watching it “for the first time” today, though sometimes the memorable quips were popping in my head (“Let’s just EAT!”) and adding to the enjoyment.

As a monster movie, it certainly fails to be very exciting. The main guy, Paul, is just as boring as a monster as he is as a human, and his co-stars are no help either. However, Johnny Longbow is something of a national treasure. Joyously playing a stereotypical American Indian (complete with a vast supply of legends to tell, an ability to make arrowheads out of anything, etc), this guy is a hoot, and keeps the film from being unwatchable. His stew recipe is quite unique (corn AND potatoes?) and his silly legends are also a riot.

Look at him. He’s amazing.

It’s a shame he doesn’t spend more time with Paul, because their first scene together makes Brokeback Mountain look pretty straight. Johnny and his students play a really odd prank on Paul, and then walks over to him and puts his arm around him as he explains the prank to his students. He then tells Paul that he is saddled with the students, to which Paul replies “Just like you were saddled with me.” Johnny pauses and says, a bit too cryptically perhaps, “Not quite.”

Also Paul has no shirt on.

Like just about all MST3k movies, the movie was edited down a bit for air, though not as much as This Island Earth or Time Chasers. Most significant was that they cut the entire opening prologue which sets up the meteor a bit. So that was nice to see, I feel I have finally gotten the full Track of the Moon Beast experience that those bastards at Best Brains have denied me these past 8 years. Strangely, a part I always THOUGHT was the result of an edit (a scene that begins with a character replying “Whatever” to someone or something we haven’t been privy to) was actually intact – it was always just a really bad edit in the film itself.

In closing, here’s an image of the monster, doing... something...

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

The Snake People (aka La Muerte Viviente)

OCTOBER 10, 2007

GENRE: CRAP, CULT
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Most horror fans know the sad fate of Boris Karloff, who spent the last few months of his life filming quick roles for a total of four productions (that were filmed entirely elsewhere). One such film was The Snake People, and unless the other three are on the other budget packs, it will be the only one I ever bother with, if Snake is any indication of their worth.

Possibly the boringest film on the entire budget set (far surpassing even Werewolf In A Girl’s Dormitory levels of plodding monotony), Snake People manages to make cannibals, lesbian “incest” (a girl makes out with herself in a nightmare), zombies, voodoo, cults, snakes, midgets, whipping, and hula dancing all seem like the least exciting elements of any film ever, not just horror. Yes, all these things and more are on display here, but they don’t connect to one another in any sensible way (I admit I was totally baffled as to what the hell was going on more than once during this film, but it didn’t make it any less boring).

I kind of got a chuckle out of the narrator though, as he sounds more like he’s describing a car or a new luxury resort as he discusses “the living death” and things of that nature. There’s also a delightful scene where a little person, who looks like he’s dressed as the Penguin from the 1960’s Batman show, repeatedly whips a girl on the back (and it seems like she’s enjoying it more than he is). But that’s not enough to warrant a recommendation, or even to rescue it from crap.

Even the goddamn credits on this film are confusing. For starters, there is an inordinate amount of people with only one name in the cast (and crew!). Also, about an hour or so into the film, we are given a title card reading “Damballah” (the name of the voodoo cult leader/god/whatever). No other such card appears in the film that I can recall. And finally, they can’t even spell basic words right:

Well, whatever movie. I’m going to go do what the movie told me to do 4000 times, and offer my dreams to Damballah. I often dream that I am on Lost, Prison Break, or 24 (sometimes two at once) – thus making my dreams a hell of a lot more interesting than whatever the hell he’s up to in this movie. Maybe it’ll give him some ideas.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

The Blancheville Monster

OCTOBER 4, 2007

GENRE: HAUNTED HOUSE (?), PSYCHOLOGICAL (?)
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

The most terrifying part of The Blancheville Monster was a single chord on the soundtrack, struck instantly after hitting play. Before an image even appeared onscreen, theree was a loud DUNNNNNNNNNN! that scared the bejesus out of me. Sadly nothing else in the film was even remotely as exciting.

Similar to The Ghost or The Game, here we have a horror movie in which everything is fake, leading me confused as to what kind of horror movie it even was. I don’t feel like making a new genre for “Girl who walks around a castle and sees the image of her father, who she thought was dead”. Because that’s pretty much all that happens until the final 15 minutes.

That fifteen minutes save the film, as we get someone buried alive, a decent surprise as to the identity of the “killer”, and the truly hilarious sight of a guy trying to evade capture while running through the woods wearing the largest cape I have ever seen. Dude, take the fucking thing off! Then there’s a hilariously abrupt cut to a “6 months later”-y scene that wraps up some subplots we weren’t really interested in to begin with.

The film is strangely shot, as if the cinematographer or director were afraid to have to edit footage together later. Instead, they pan around wildly to get everything we need to see. But when the camera is actually staying on a person or item, it’s not shakicam. They literally pan the camera around while it’s on a tripod or whatever. Very odd. And annoying. “Look! Over there!” someone will say, and a few seconds are wasted while the camera pans over to whatever it is we should already be seeing.

Also, what kind of goddamn name for a monster is Blancheville? That’s the least foreboding name in all of human history. The Smith Monster would be more exciting.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

October Extras #3 - Haunts

OCTOBER 3, 2007

GENRE: PSYCHOLOGICAL
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)
LAST SEEN: OCTOBER 2006 (DVD)

I remember it like it was about a year ago... I was at Best Buy, buying the best things I could find, when I stumbled upon what seemed like a treasure in DVD form: 50 horror movies for 20 bucks. Seeing such well-known titles as Deep Red, Bad Taste, and Driller Killer in the mix, I assumed all 50 films were of equal merit, just not as well known. So I plunked down my 21.64 (fuck you, tax!) and went home.

Opening the box and reading the capsule descriptions for each film, I was bummed to discover that a lot of the movies sounded pretty terrible. In fact, it took me like a half hour to find one that sparked my interest enough to inaugurate the set: Haunts, which promised a slasher movie with a twist ending.

(Note - a few weeks after I bought the set, I bought a new TV, HDTV/16:9 blah blah. The horrendous video quality (not to mention full frame transfers) meant that I would never again watch a film from the set at home. Haunts remains the only one I didn’t watch at work (not to mention the only one I didn’t watch specifically for Horror Movie A Day).)

Now that’ I’ve worked my way through about 90% of the set, I can safely say that Haunts is definitely one of the more interesting movies, worth far more than the 40 cents or so each one set me back. The description makes it sound more like a slasher film than it is, but that’s OK. The film is a strange, atmospheric psychological drama about a woman slowly going nuts as some pretty terrible childhood memories began to resurface. Few people fully enjoy the film, and it’s amazing how many random (read: wrong) sub-genres the IMDb lists it under (among them, Zombie, Demon, and Supernatural – all in a film without so much as a single non-realistic element).

About a month after I first saw the film, I saw the highly underrated The Return, which was similar in pace and “Not really horror!” tone (and, like Haunts, was marketed as a totally different type of movie). Given my undying love of excess, one might assume that a film as sparse and “slow” as these would be the bane of my existence, but that’s not the case. In fact, I love slow movies just as much as fast ones (my two favorite non horror movies this year certainly support this statement – Shoot Em Up and The Assassination of Jesse James...). There’s something about being slowly drawn into a fairly simple story that appeals to me. In Haunts' case, I’ve already described the entire plot; there’s very little else to the narrative. The occasional murder is more or less a macguffin, the film is really about this poor girl’s sexually repressed lifestyle sadly getting the better of her. It doesn’t exactly get the adrenaline pumping, but it works, at least for me.

I mean come on, this guy is the "killer". Would
anyone really make a slasher film based on him?

And also, Cameron Mitchell plays the uncle, which puts him in the cast of a record 10% of the Chilling Classics set. I don’t know if that’s something to be proud of or not, but there it is. As always, he’s pretty bad, but that’s our Cameron! And for some reason he plays the final 10 minutes of the film with his hair drenched in white paint (or perhaps milk).

See?

The transfer on this film is among the poorest on the set, with some sort of odd “Auto-contrast” option being used that turns almost every intentionally dark shot into an ugly, washed out and murky gray. Far as I know, it’s not available by itself on DVD, but I understand the VHS (!!) is actually of better quality.

And how’s this for a weird coincidence – both this movie and yesterday’s "October Extra" were scored by Pino Donaggio (this one’s almost as good too, if a bit too 70s). Note I said ‘weird’, not ‘interesting’.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Gothic

OCTOBER 3, 2007

GENRE: HORROR?, PSYCHOLOGICAL
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

There is nothing that pisses me off more than when someone waits until the cashier gives a customer their total to take out their wallet (this is even more offensive when it’s a place like target, where you slide the credit card yourself and can do so while the cashier is still scanning your stuff). But running a close 2nd is when I read a plot description that is fascinating, and then the movie turns out to be borderline incoherent, like Ken Russell’s Gothic.

According to Mill Creek’s write up, the film is allegedly about the insane night that Mary Shelley got the idea for Frankenstein. She was partying with Lord Byron and some other folks, everyone got high, things got out of hand, etc. That could make for a great movie, wouldn’t you say? Doesn’t say much about Mary Shelley (“She was a drug fiend who hung out with deviants, and viola: one of the greatest stories in all literature”), but still.

Well the actual movie is simply Gabriel Byrne, inexplicably made to look like the brunette guy from Air Supply, and his friends literally laughing and running around like assholes in a mansion, set to a wildly inappropriate score (a game of hide and seek – and mind you, these are grown men and women – is set to music that might accompany the “We won!” music in a Disney movie about a ragtag sports team who comes back and beats their rivals in the championship). Meanwhile, Julian Sands (between this and Phantom of the Opera, I think I’m gonna ban this guy from my Netflix queue) and another guy spend most of the film spinning around and spouting off “insane” dialogue that seems made up on the spot. And the Mary Shelley character seems more or less an afterthought.

The film doesn’t really have a narrative that I can discern, but is more just a series of “shocking” events and “scenettes”, such as this pointless encounter. Gabriel Byrne looks at the floor and sees this:

Then the camera cuts to this:

Then he pokes it and it turns back into the pig head. Fine, movie.

I won’t call the movie crap, because there’s something undeniably appealing about it. In fact, if I was in the mood, I’d probably spend the entire movie laughing, especially during the last half hour, which features a guy saying “Pot pig... pot penis.... pot belly...” and a woman with eyes where her nipples should be:

I bet that creepy thing from Pan’s Labyrinth would love to hit that.

Also, the production value and Russell’s direction are inspired; you can watch any one scene out of context and be left intrigued. But it adds up to nothing, and you’ll find yourself saying “Where the hell did THAT come from?” with every other scene. I’ve seen better narrative flow while flipping channels at two in the morning. Way to mostly waste a potentially interesting concept (as a horror film or not)!

For no real reason I should point out that this movie is one of the very few on the Chilling Classics set that retains the film’s end credits sequence, giving it an air of legitimacy among the others. Had I taken notice of the dialogue editing, it’s nice to know that I could give credit to Peter Pennell for it without having to do any research.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Hands Of A Stranger

OCTOBER 1, 2007

GENRE: HERO KILLER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

The thing about movies like Hands Of A Stranger is that they are all more or less the same. Guy gets new body part, at first he’s all excited, then things get weird, and sooner or later he’s killing folks. Part of why I like Body Parts is that it actually had the original owner come back for his appendages (though this was introduced so late into the film it felt very awkward).

This one also takes quite a bit of time to get going. The sympathetic people take far too long discussing whether or not the guy should be given new hands. Since there would be no movie if he didn’t, it’s sort of a waste of everyone’s time to spend like 10 minutes debating the matter. Hilariously, the sister of the eventual killer even points out that she fears the hands will be those of a psychopath and thus her brother will turn into one as well. I guess she’s seen some of the other movies (though I should point out this one pre-dates all the others I know of, such as Oliver Stone’s The Hand).

But there’s some good stuff here and there. One of the first victims basically dies of her own clumsiness, knocking over a lamp and causing a fire. And then, as she becomes engulfed in flame, her body immediately turns into a lump of ash and collapses in a heap on the floor. It’s hilarious.

Also, there’s a child murder, always a plus. And the kid is so goddamn annoying, you gotta figure the guy would have killed him regardless of whose hands he had. The guy tries to play piano, and does miserably, leading the kid to say “Wow mister, you sure do stink!” or something. Fuck you, you little brat!

The film’s ending is also worth a chuckle. After the jerk killer is killed, the cop and the doctor who performed the surgery look into camera for a full minute or so, barely emoting at all as they say their “What a shame” style offerings. We are then told, for whatever reason, in full screen letters: “What is past is prologue!” ....True?

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Panic (aka Bakterion)

SEPTEMBER 20, 2007

GENRE: MONSTER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

There is but one original idea in Panic (aka Bakterion), and it technically comes before the opening credits. For once in the cinematic history of the “Scientist becomes rampaging monster” movie, the accident actually happens BEFORE the movie begins proper. We see a monster attack, and then some science folks are talking about a missing scientist in the next scene.

Well actually there are two original ideas. As far as I know, no other film has had a superimposed alarm clock on the bottom right of the screen for no goddamn reason:

Whatever.

Anyway the rest of the movie is pretty boring. However, there’s a delightfully meta moment when a guy says “Dreadful actors, don’t you agree?”, in regards to some scientists who are pretending that they didn’t possibly unleash a virus that could kill everyone in the world. It’s nice. Also, there’s a scene where some will-be victims are in a movie theater, and the movie they are watching is possibly the only film ever made less interesting than the one they're in.

The main problem with the movie is that the monster only kills folks we don’t know. Therefore the movie only has two types of scenes: Scientists and police worrying about how to stop him or how it happened, or some people we don’t know doing something somewhere and then being killed. No suspense, no tension, just a Moebius strip of monster movie clichés.

There’s also a peculiar fascination with Psycho – the music is very Herrmann-y, and there’s even a shower scene. Why anyone would want to reference Psycho in a movie about a scientist running around the sewers as he turns into a monster is beyond me.

The climax of the film, save for the random clock, is one of the laziest I’ve ever seen. The monster is killed by a tiny fire extinguisher, someone makes a phone call that we can’t hear, and then two guys who are in a fighter jet, about to nuke the city, get ANOTHER phone call that we don’t hear. One guy then says “Hey, we don’t have to fire!” and they fly away. The end. Oh, and then we are given this non-chilling warning:

Again, whatever. One less budget pack movie to go.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

The Witches' Mountain

SEPTEMBER 18, 2007

GENRE: CULT, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

What is it about the movies that involve cults on the Chilling Classics set that make me like them even though they are technically awful? The Witches’ Mountain is no exception: it’s poorly photographed, seemingly on pause most of the time, and doesn’t make a lick of sense, yet I remain compelled by its non-narrative and heartily recommend it, same as I did for Crypt Of The Living Dead and Devil’s Hand.

A big part of the attraction here is the soundtrack. It’s.... wow. Let’s see, there’s one composition that sounds better suited for the music that would play over an opening credits sequence of someone driving along the California coast, yet it plays over a scene of a woman finding a cat stabbed to death in her bed. Then there’s a lot of chanting stuff, apropos of what is going on in the scene. And then near the end there’s something that could only be described as the Mexican Choir version of ELO’s "Eldorado".

What any of that has to do with horror, well your guess is as good as mine. It’s not so much a horror movie as it is a “Guy takes pictures on a mountain while his girlfriend drinks tea with an old woman” movie. But she’s a damn fine looking woman, as is ex-wife, who appears in one scene in the beginning that is so far removed from the rest of the film, one has no other option than to believe that she will be part of a “twist” at the end.

The end of the film is just as laid back as everything else. After developing his photos and seeing people in them that weren’t there when he took the shot (there’s even one picture he took in which he himself appears – yet this doesn’t really seem to startle him), he tells his girlfriend they have to leave, at which point some poorly photographed scenes of people carrying green flames begin, resulting in a bunch of woman literally throwing themselves on him and his girlfriend takes a cliff dive. The final shot of the film involves what looks like a colander attached to a medieval speak n spell, and damned if I have any idea what the fuck it’s supposed to mean.

But I liked it. Hell I almost wanted to watch it again. How can you not like a movie that includes a casting credit that reads “With the special collaboration of John Smith” (not the actual name – I didn’t write it down in my notes). That’s WAY better than “Special Appearance by” or “Guest starring”. Plus it has a chick who looks like Eva Longoria blowing up a snake or something.

I really don’t have a goddamn clue what is going on here. But maybe that’s how it ended up on the same disc as Bad Taste (!!!) and Deep Red (!!!!!!), two actual, legitimate, GOOD movies that the Creek somehow got their hands on. It deserves to be among giants.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter

SEPTEMBER 17, 2007

GENRE: MAD SCIENTIST, MONSTER, WEIRD
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Until a few days ago, I never would have had any interest in watching Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter, but I happened to see the new film about James, with an equally ridiculous title: The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford, a film that was quite excellent, although missing the key chapter in James’ life where his partner got turned into a monster.

See, whenever I see a historical film I really like, I tend to believe I am truly interested in the real story, and usually go buy a book or a documentary about it (which I did for James, as it was based on a book to begin with). And then the book/doc goes unread/watched as I eventually re-lose interest. It’s an expensive habit, as it leaves me with lots more books I’ll probably never read. Which is why I’ll never watch Mel Brooks’ History of the World.

Anyway, while The Assassination... was a great film, this one is just a boring waste of time. With a title like that, you’d think you were in for some fun, but the film is played totally straight. Worse, the film is far more about Jesse James, i.e. a western, than about Frankenstein’s daughter, i.e. a horror movie. And worse still, the title isn’t even accurate, since the girl is the GRANDdaughter of the good doctor. What, were they worried that Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Granddaughter would sound silly?

Like all Frankenstein films, there’s a birth scene, and that one’s fine for the day (especially when the ‘daughter’ keeps yelling “You are now Igor!” with a ridiculous accent, one that makes “Igor!” sound more like “evil!”), but it’s pretty much the only horror scene in the damn thing. Everything else is a standard western, complete with a backstabbing partner, a saloon brawl (this scene includes Nestor Paiva - still a total load), a holdup, a Mexican woman, etc. Even when the monster is alive, he’s not very threatening. He’s just a shirtless dumb guy in a western.

Well, whatever. I am one film closer to completing the entire budget pack, at which time I believe Mill Creek will name me their executive vice president of acquisitions and accounting. Or at least send me the Decrepit Crypt of Nightmares (the likely heir to the Chilling Classics throne) set.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Driller Killer

SEPTEMBER 2, 2007

GENRE: EXPLOITATION, SERIAL KILLER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

This review should be read LOUD!

How can a movie called Driller Killer be so goddamn boring? Come on! This one reminded me of Naked Massacre for some reason, but at least that film, itself no masterpiece, moved along fairly nicely. This one took FOREVER to get to the driller killering and then it moved so fast I couldn’t even understand what was happening at times.

The ending, however, is pretty sweet, and rescued this one out of the crap label. Like yesterday’s Alone With Her, it’s a downer ending. It’s also given one of the strangest cinematic presentations I can recall. The film fades to red and we simply listen to the climax. More ideas like that that could have made this film worthwhile.

The rest though is as generic as they come. There’s the usual padding, awful acting, nonsensical asides (why is Reno on the roof watching a guy get randomly stabbed?), kills that make little to no anatomical sense, etc. There IS a brief lesbian scene though, so there’s something. We are also given the world’s most over-populated band (there’s a scene where a couple of their back up singers fight some of their OTHER back up singers!!).

This one’s being remade. I am all for it. Remaking films that were good ideas done badly should be a lot more common than it is. I just hope that someone, someday, can make a decent movie out of Vampire$.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

The Ghost (aka Lo Spettro)

AUGUST 30, 2007

GENRE: GHOST (?)
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Well The Ghost started off promisingly enough. The instant the film begins, someone says “That’s enough for tonight.” Who he is, what they are doing, and how long they have been doing it is none of our goddamn business. It’s enough, and that is all we need to know.

But then it goes downhill, as it’s a slow and fairly standard “Horrid shrew of a woman plots with her lover to kill her rich husband” movie. And there’s no ghost. When the title of a film only has one actual word, you’d think it would describe something in the movie. But not here. There’s a guy PRETENDING to be a ghost, but that doesn’t count. The end of the film is also too needlessly loaded with double-crosses. All of these people are despicable, so I don’t even know if the good guy ‘won’ or not.

Still, there’s enough here to warrant a view. The scene where Barbara Steele goes nuts and slashes one of the other characters to death is pretty gory for its day (1963 by my watch and warrant), and, well, it stars Barbara Steele. Mmm. There’s also an exchange that may or may not have given Jim Steinman the idea for one of his most famous songs:

“If you loved me you’d do anything.”
“Anything, yes. Not that.”

Hahahaha whoa! So maybe that’s what “that” is! Meat Loaf would do anything except plot to kill his lover’s husband in an attempt to get his gold! Oh Meat, you old softy.

There’s also a guy who sounds like Vincent Price, and another named Canon Owens. It’s a fairly stupid name (won't just Canon, or just Owens, suffice?), but it’s made even more nonsensical in the scene where he talks to the husband, who is named Dr. Hitchcock. For whatever reason, the two of them continually repeat each other’s name as they talk. So it’s like:

“Hi Dr Hitchcock.”
“Hi Canon Owens.”
“How are you, Dr Hitchcock?”
“I am fine, Canon Owens, and you?”
“I am very good, Dr Hitchcock. Thank you for asking.”

But this got me thinking – I realize when I write a lot of my reviews that I have to go back to the IMDb or something to find out the characters’ names, and that’s because no one writes like that anymore. You get a character’s name spoken maybe once in the movie (if that), and that’s it. You have to pay attention these days!

Well I don’t want to! I have ADD, and I want my viewing experience to be perfectly...

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Werewolf In A Girl's Dormitory

AUGUST 21, 2007

GENRE: CRAP, WEREWOLF
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Some professor: “I believe it was a lycanthropist.”
Some other guy: “In other words, a sort of werewolf.”

That’s just a sampling of the plethora of worthless dialogue that you’ll hear in any given minute of Werewolf In A Girl’s Dormitory, which barely even lives up to its boring, SOAP-esque title, as only like two scenes find the wolf inside the dorm. It'd be like if you called Titanic "Treasure Diving".

Whether the dialogue has any relevance or not doesn’t even matter, because all of it is dubbed by folks who never quite reach “Bad SNL host reading his cue cards” levels of laziness. Whether they were just trying to match the mouth movements of the original actors (who are almost as wooden as their dubbers anyway), or they are just stupid people, lines like “I’ll call…. police” delivered in this manner only serve to make a bad movie worse.

But the biggest problem is how dreadfully boring the goddamn thing is. Rather than simply have a werewolf run into a dorm, find a girl and kill her every 10 minutes or so, which is all anyone would want out of a movie with such a title, they try to legitimize the damn thing by adding a plot involving blackmail, affairs, etc. Werewolves and Dormitories don’t show up nearly as much as threatening letters and courtyards. So again, it’s a lot like SOAP.

One scene in particular nearly sent me into a fit. Early on in the film, the werewolf hurts one of its front legs, so naturally the human everyone is seeking would have an injured arm (this leads to having to come up with an excuse for an injured arm for every red herring). As the scene begins, one suspect is in a bar, and someone says “Hey, his right arm isn’t functioning!” The suspect responds by pulling out a knife with his left hand… and then easily opening it with his right. And no one notices. Then a guy just sort of mentions offhand “You’ll never get away,” in the same tone one might point out someone’s untied shoe. Then another guy calmly grabs him, which results in the suspect’s friend yelling out “Stop it! You’re all going mad!” When in reality everyone is just sort of standing around not saying anything. In less than one minute of screen time you can see pretty much everything wrong with this movie.

Main girl’s kinda cute though. And her character’s name is Priscilla, which resulted in my singing of the appropriate Meat Loaf song every time her name was said. “Priscilla! Priscilla! Nearly sixteen but they treat you like a kid…”

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

A Bucket Of Blood (1959)

AUGUST 17, 2007

GENRE: COMEDIC, HERO KILLER, WEIRD
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

"Smokey says, only YOU can prevent Roger Corman." - Mike Nelson

You gotta love Corman though. Who else would make not one but TWO movies that are about nerdy guys accidentally killing someone and finding fame, only to continue doing it more and more? Seeing that he would often write a film just to use up remaining time on a set, it shouldn't come as no surprise that Little Shop Of Horrors, which came a year or so after A Bucket Of Blood, had similar themes. Bless him.

Any movie with Dick Miller can't be altogether bad, but this is the rare film that actually STARS the beloved character actor. He plays the worst kind of person in the world: one who aspires to be a hipster (back in the 50s, they were called beatniks). And he's a whiny bastard. But it's Miller, so all is forgiven. Plus, the audible sight of hearing a guy refer to Dick Miller as 'kid' is worth the price of admission alone (which, since this was on the budget pack, was precisely 40 cents).

You also gotta love a movie that is only 65 minutes long and yet still has padding. There's a guy who they cut to singing a folk song every 10 minutes or so, and perhaps his songs are commenting on the story, like Dead & Breakfast, but the audio is so bad I can't understand a goddamn word he is saying. This is in stark contrast to the beginning of the film, where the lyrics/dialogue are simply drowned out by the score itself. The film also features the hippie version of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern; two guys who are seemingly always around, occasionally helping propel the plot forward and often just sort of waxing rhapsodic about things like vitamins. Whether Gary Oldman and Tim Roth will star in a spinoff that focuses entirely on these guys remains to be seen.

Naturally, the intended scares of the film are totally dwarfed by the terrifying sight and sound of a room full of hippies saying nonsense like "Life is an obscure hobo, bumming a ride on the omnibus of art." and doing spoken word poetry. The scene where Miller finally 'becomes' an artist is also horrifying, as he dons a french artist's hat, long cigarette, and all black clothing. Dammit hippies, leave Mr. Futterman alone!!!

The short running time means some things are left unresolved: How did the cat get into the wall? How does a cop managed to get killed via frying pan when he has his attacker at gunpoint? Why is there a guy hanging out in a fireplace?

No matter, this one's pretty damn good for a Corman movie. And it was remade with Anthony Michael Hall. He was the first famous person I met when I came to LA. So... there's something?

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Revenge Of Dr. X (aka The Double Garden)

AUGUST 14, 2007

GENRE: MONSTER
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Well it had to happen sooner or later… Ladies and Gentlemen, an Ed Wood movie!

Technically. Revenge Of Dr. X not REALLY one of his, as it was merely written by the lad and directed by someone slightly more competent. But the title makes up for it. You see kids, the name of this movie is actually The Double Garden, or sometimes Venus Flytrap. But for whatever reason, the credits on the film (which are presented out of order and timed erratically) are from another movie all together. But really, would you expect any less from the unholy alliance of Ed Wood and Mill Creek? It’s amazing there’s anything on the disc at all.

So for obvious reasons, there’s no Doctor X, nor is there any Revenge. I'm not even sure if there's an “Of”. But I can’t understand why the description basically gives away the climax of the film. The Creek includes this in their synopsis: “Using radical techniques and falling into madness, the scientist eventually (note – that’s a key word: EVENTUALLY) creates a plant creature that feeds on flesh and blood, which then sets off to find food in the form of the people of a nearby community.” It’s a flurry of prepositional phrases that describes something that occurs far past the halfway mark of the film. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: anything that occurs past the halfway mark should NOT be included in the synopsis. But this is a new benchmark in what I call “Capritis”*, as the plant doesn’t even come alive until past the two-thirds mark and doesn’t “set off” until the final reel.

Until then, we are stuck with our hero, a man so grouchy looking and just plain assholish that he makes Walter Matthau look like Santa Claus. The film begins with him literally yelling at clouds, only to then order a shuttle launch based on the assumption that the wind will continue blowing in a favorable direction (good to know they leave it up to chance). He then spends 5 minutes or so screaming and yelling at two guys who made a miscalculation (we never even know the nature of the error, for all we know they just split the lunch check wrong). Thus, he is ordered to go to Japan to ‘relax’, but he pretty much yells at everyone there too. In his least charming moment, when the plant has come to life, he orders his assistant to get him some chickens and goats to feed it. Then he grabs a small puppy and goes “In the meantime…”, fully prepared to toss the poor thing into the monster’s claws. Our hero.

I’m not sure if Ed Wood could have done a better job directing the film either. Kenneth Crane emulates him well, with stock footage, confusing editing, and the occasional image like this:

There’s also an endless scene of the two leads driving around a mountain, with lots of shots seemingly taken from a camera loosely strapped to the roof. All set to what could best be described as Japanese circus music.

Still, I can’t call the movie crap, because the design of the plant is just so goddamn amazing I wanted to kiss my monitor:

That’s pretty much exactly what I imagine the baby would look like if all of the Super Mario Bros 2 enemies gang-raped a radish.

What say you?

*So named for Frank Capra’s It’s A Wonderful Life, a film everyone will describe as being about a guy who sees what life would be like without him, an event that occurs in the film’s final act. It’s really about how you shouldn’t trust fat men with your money if they’re finished reading their newspaper.

PLEASE, GO ON...

Crypt Of The Living Dead

AUGUST 8, 2007

GENRE: VAMPIRE
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

Man, I am down to like 10 movies left on my beloved budget pack. And some of them aren’t even horror. For example, one movie carries this description: “A man begins to investigate the death of his brother, who died from eating a hamburger laced with ground glass. With the police case stalled because of ineptness, the man’s investigation leads him toward a beatnik hangout frequented by Nico, a shady character who supplies drugs to the patrons and philosophizes about the ills of the world.” Now while a movie filled with beatniks IS indeed terrifying, it’s still not gonna fly for Horror Movie A Day.

On the plus side, finishing the set will means I’ll hopefully be watching a lot less stuff like Crypt of the Living Dead, an alleged vampire movie that somehow manages to showcase more shots of pulleys than shots of vampires.

The description on this one is pretty ridiculous too, not to mention acting as a direct nuclear strike against grammar:

“An archaeologist visits a remote island to bury his late father and, despite the warnings from the local people, opens the tomb of the vampire queen, buried over 700 years ago. This foolish act by the archaeologist and his reporter friend places the entire island in danger, including the local school teacher that the two men are rivals for her affection. With the school teacher in danger of being a sacrifice to the vampire queen, the duo sets out to stop the vampires, rescue the teacher and destroy the vampire queen.”

Well for starters, his “reporter friend” is the woman’s brother, so if he was a romantic rival this would be a much better film. They also say “vampire queen” a couple times more than necessary, not to mention introduce her as if we should have known she existed.

Plus it makes the movie sound more interesting than it is. A more truthful description would be:

“A guy who looks like Fred Armisen doing a parody of John Carpenter is drawn to an island to bury his father, and in doing so opens a tomb that releases an evil we don’t really see until the final few minutes. In the meantime, his reporter friend talks Seussically about drugs and we discover that some vampire worshippers killed his father on purpose because they somehow knew he would come to the island and open the tomb in order to retrieve the body, rather than just fucking open it themselves.”

See? Much better.

Still it’s a puzzlingly appealing movie, even though nothing happens I was strangely drawn to it, and not just because the bad guy looked like Jerry Dandridge. At any rate, it’s certainly worth sitting through until the end so you can hear the truly odd scream of the vampire queen as she falls to hear death. If I had to describe it, I’d say it sounded like a dying cat imitating the sound of someone trying to start a car. While drunk.

There’s also a line of dialogue that made me laugh out loud, because it was so damn snooty: “We sent a man to the moon, and we have magic flowers to protect us from vampires… seems we haven’t come very far in the past 1000 years.” Either the guy is a bit misinformed about the origins of NASA, or he just expects way too much out of his fellow man. I think going to the moon and using garlic is pretty goddamn genius. Sure, maybe they’re not as stunning a display of brainpower as building a pulley system in order to lift the lid of a coffin, but they’re still pretty swell.

Bizarrely, Mill Creek’s version is black and white (every other version I have found is in color), but I think it actually kind of works for the story, which focuses more on being atmospheric than on what some folks might call “action”. There’s also an annoying technical snafu that results in 5-10 seconds of silent blackness whenever the reel changes. Again, not that any Mill Creek transfer will win any awards, but they can at least make an effort for my 40 cents.

Like Horror Express, this one is well suited for a remake. There’s a good story in there (it’s sort of Wicker Man-ish in fact) but the technical nonsense and total lack of anything actually happening bring it down.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

The Devil's Hands

AUGUST 7, 2007

GENRE: PUPPET, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (BUDGET PACK!!!)

I miss the old days, before I was born, when movies like The Devil’s Hands could be 71 minutes long and no one would complain. Now the average length of a movie is like 1:50. And most of the time, the running time is padded. Luckily this year is seeing a sort of resurgence in shorter films. Shoot Em Up and The Kingdom both clock in under 1:40 with credits (and along with Hatchet, are my favorite movies of the year. Coincidence?)

(Probably.)

This one’s pretty fun, and in fact I would be all for a remake, since the film was apparently a tad under budgeted. For starters, most of it takes place in about 3 ugly rooms. We also never get much insight into the cult the whole movie focuses on. There’s a subplot about a reporter getting the dirt on them, but what the hell could he possibly report? “Tuesday. We sat around and listened to the leader blather on about Gamba again.” Come on, sacrifice a goddamn goat or something.

The doll usage was also a bit underdeveloped. The cult uses voodoo dolls made in the members’ images, but again, they barely use this device for any storytelling purposes. Instead, most of the film is given to the lead character looking totally bored by the cult he has just thrown his life away to join (his primary reason for joining is, of course, the ability to fuck the blonde member he is smitten with).

Dammit, this movie should be a half an hour longer!

The transfer is pretty bad, even for Budget Pack standards. There are a lot of missing chunks of frames, resulting in some hilarious jump cuts (at one point, someone says to another character “You should leave” and then there’s a jump cut, and now she’s right by the door). But the transfer can’t be blamed for the other odd editing decisions sprinkled without, such as the music that cuts along with the film (not jump cuts).

And what the hell did Associate Producer Mike Newberry do to piss off the title sequence creator? While all the other credits last for about 4-5 seconds, poor Mike gets about 20 frames.

Anyway, it’s a decent enough little movie; a good idea trapped in somewhat lazy filmmaking.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...