Halloween 2026: October 5th

 

The Housemaid (2016)
Cô Hầu Gái

Vietnam doesn't really have the tradition of horror movies that many of its neighboring nations do. The Wikipedia article on Vietnamese cinema references a short from 1937 entitled "Toét's Scared of Ghosts," supposedly one of the first fictional films made in the country and a "comedy with a slight romantic horror theme." There's also a Vietnamese-made Hong Kong production from '37 called "The Ghost Field" but I'm betting any ghosts in that one are probably of the metaphorical variety. Because most early Vietnamese films are documentaries or propaganda efforts. After the war and the unification, it seems social-realism was the primary genre favored by studios and audiences for several decades. There's a 1999 movie called "The Building" (Chung cư), that most sources describe as a straight-ahead social drama but IMDb's plot synopsis pitches like a haunted house movie, so I'm not sure what to think about that. Generally speaking though, Vietnamese cinema didn't try to catch up with the J-horror fad until the 2000s. A 2004 drama called "Spirits" seems to incorporate some supernatural activity. A 2007 Korean co-production, "Muoi: Legend of a Portrait," sounds like a proper local variation on the ever popular "stringy-haired ghost girl" premise and is frequently listed as the country's first true horror movie. Since then, there's been an ongoing attempt to establish Vietnamese horror for real. Probably the most acclaimed example is "The Housemaid," a 2016 film from Derek Nguyen, which actually got some decent distribution over here. 

Our story takes place in 1953, in the midst of the First Indochina War. A young woman named Linh mysteriously appears at a rubber plantation deep in the woods, seeking work. Stern headmistress Mrs. Han reluctantly takes her in, advising her to know her place and never make eye contact with her French masters. Linh soon learns that the home is said to be haunted. That owner Captain Sebastian had a wife and daughter but, after being left alone for so long, the madame murdered the child and drowned herself. And her spirit is said to still wander the grounds. After Sebastian returns home suddenly with a war wound, Linh is tasked with nursing him back to health. They get to know each other and soon a passionate love affair ensues. All the while, threatening visions of Madame Christine pursue Linh. Soon enough, people begin to wind up dead around the mansion. 

If "The Housemaid" was a deliberate attempt by Nguyen and his team to establish Vietnam genre filmmaking on the international scene, it's easy to see the path they took. The film belongs to the classy tradition of gothic ghost stories and haunted period pieces, drawing some clear inspiration from "The Innocents" and "Jane Eyre." The mansion setting is handsome, filled with many shadowy corners and brooding windows. Fog seems to perpetually float over the forest floor. A gloomy atmosphere of repressed passion and barely concealed secrets prevails. The film does indulge in some noisier scares. The ghost of Madame Christine, a rotting corpse in a tattered gown, has a habit of leaping out and screeching at people. There's an attempted axe murder and a fairly well done sequence involving some zombies rising from the forest floor. The editing and sound design is a bit overdone at times. However, "The Housemaid" mostly does a serviceable job invoking some misty, ghost story ambiance without spoiling it too much with obnoxious loud shrieks and sudden intrusions. 

Aside from belonging to a classier type of horror, “The Housemaid” is also all too aware of the class and social boundaries facing its protagonist. Linh faces the challenges of being both a woman and a servant. One of Captain Sebastian's military pals attempts to insult her, while Mrs. Han repeatedly reminds her that she is not of the same strata as her employers. Even after beginning the affair with the man of the house, Linh receives scornful glances from his (white) fiancee, who declares her not pretty enough to be cheated on with. While these kinds of divisions and pressures are universal, “The Housemaid” is also distinctly Vietnamese though. Among the plantation staff is a cruel overseer, who nostalgically recalls the days of being able to torture deserters and others he deems “ungrateful.” These speak to specific abuses and injustices the Vietnamese faced under French imperialism. The film attempts to tie both its haunting story and its social minded, historical elements together into a twist ending that I don't think I entirely understood. Nevertheless, this is clearly a film where the boundaries of class and racism keep the heroine imprisoned as much as the haunting does. 

While I think there's some good skill on display here, and the film is sound in much of its writing and construction, “The Housemaid” ultimately left me a little unsatisfied. The pace is slow, almost dirge-like at times, as we watch Linh's daily misery. Meanwhile, her romance with her employer seems almost inevitable, the two destined to end up together as much as any other male and female lead in a romance story would. The film attempts to make the romance feel less mechanical. There's some passionate love scenes and a moment where Sebastian tearfully begs for Linh's forgiveness. However, it all comes across as more melodramatic than anything else. That emphasis of oversized emotions are present in other elements of the film, in the way it tries a little too hard with some of its ghost sequence or in the broader actions of some of the supporting cast. 

“The Housemaid” is not one of those tedious dramas, concerned only with making its social statements, that includes a handful of ghosts or nightmares to qualify for the much more commercially popular genre of horror. I do think the film is genuinely invested in the ghost story and handles it, from time to time, quite well. The appreciation of misty gothic atmosphere is very real. However, I do feel like the script is never quite able to bring its romance story, ghostly haunting, and class-drama threads together into a satisfying whole. Maybe a stronger lead performance would have helped, as Nhung Kate as Linh is a bit stiff at times. Either way, it's merely an okay, not great, attempt at a Vietnamese ghost story. [6/10]

 

Crypt of the Vampire (1964)
La cripta e l’incubo

If Sheridan Le Fanu's “Carmilla” must hold the title of Second Most Influential Vampire Novel in Literary History, I would say that's still a rather honorable position to be in. Obviously, “Dracula” would essentially invent the pop culture vampire. However, that krazy Karnstein was there first. The novel has gotten its own share of adaptations too, if not nearly as many to rival the Count. In fact, for the second time this season, I've found myself going into a seemingly unrelated vampire movie only to realize it's another adaptation of Le Fanu's book. While “Alucarda” was clearly a case of being merely inspired by the text, 1964's “Crypt of the Vampire” – alternatively known as “Terror in the Crypt” and probably a dozen other titles – is actually one of the more faithful adaptations I've seen. It's another film from Christopher Lee's Italian period, made when he had a week off from filming “The Whip and the Body.” 

Years ago, Sheena Karnstein was persecuted for the crime of witchcraft. Before being executed, she put a curse on the family, promising to return and haunt them again some day. Centuries later, Count Ludwig lives in the same castle with his daughter, Laura. Laura is haunted by reoccurring nightmares. Ludwig is afraid that she is possessed by the spirit of Sheena. Laura holds this concern too and has made her handmaid promise to kill her, should she ever be taken over by an evil ancestor. The castle sees two guests arrive. The first is Klauss, a scholar recruited to uncover the portrait of Sheena, revealing if Laura resembles her or not. Secondly, a carriage wreck leaves a young woman named Ljuba at the home. Her and Laura become fast friends but her nightmares persists. Strange murders begin to happen around the castle too, making Ludwig increasingly concerned that his daughter is now a vampire.

I've brought this up surely a dozen times before but it bares repeating. If an old horror movie has really pretty, black-and-white photography, I'm willing to give it a pass on so many other things. Well, let me tell you: “Crypt of the Vampire” is not a classic, by any means. Its story is somehow both a bit repetitive and somewhat confusing. It seems a large portion of the script is devoted to re-emphasizing that Ludwig is worried about his daughter, without really specifying how the curse is supposed to work. Her maid is also a witch, which is separately referred to as both a good thing and a bad thing at different times. None of the characters are that distinct and it's easy to confuse them. The pacing is rather slow, the audience often left wondering when the point will arrive. 

All of this is true and yet... “Crypt of the Vampire” is so pretty. Filmed at the Castello Piccolomini, the genuine ancient ambiance goes a long way. A shot of Laura running through the castle halls, coming to a large locked door right before the lights go out, is a great example of how far the location goes. Julio Orlas and Giuseppe Aquari's cinematography is rich with shadows. An especially stunning sequence involves an ascent up the staircase, carrying a rather unique candelabra, throwing brilliant shadows on the walls around. In general, the film builds some impressively creepy sequences. The discovery of why a bell is ringing or Laura's reoccurring nightmares prove to hit the exact sweet spot for rich, monochromatic shivers that I long for. 

“Dracula” and “Carmilla” are linked by the role dreams play in both stories. The vampire in each is an incubus-like figure, arriving to take something from the sleeping maiden while she is unawares. By devoting significant screen time to Laura's dreams, “Crypt” brings the idea that the vampire arises from the subconscious to mind much more clearly. This is further emphasized by the film barely disguising the queer subtext of the source material. Laura and Ljuba grow very close, very fast. They are often giving each other long, meaningful looks or little touches on the shoulders. They do seem to spend a lot of time together in their nightgowns. When Klauss makes his romantic interest in Laura known, she outright says she prefers Ljuba's company to his. Having the bite of a vampire seemingly bring sexual bliss is nothing new. It plays in slightly different context when it's two young women, their passions for each other unspoken, the sexual taste and the undead nature going hand-in-hand. If the vampire lurks in the subconscious, it lives in the same shadowy realm as the desires we oppress and try to ignore but that inevitably bubble up as we dream. 

Repressed sexuality is not the only thing lurking down there in the shade-blanketed neither land of our subconscious. Throughout the film, Count Ludwig is overcome with shame that his bloodline has doomed his daughter. He's such a devoted father, that he fears making his relationship with another woman in the castle obvious to Laura. He wants to protect her from the outside world, unaware that corruption is already working its fangs into her, in an innocent seeming form. Moreover, his own fear has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. By talking about the family curse, putting the idea in his daughter's head, he's insured that she's interested and fearful of this too. Thus, the parent has made sure that what he's most worried will certainly come to pass. It's another manifestation of our secret fears, shame, guilt, and worries arising out of the abyss of the mind and becoming reality.

The films he shot aboard in Italy, Spain, or Germany did not always ask Christopher Lee to do much more than glower or stand around menacingly. He does plenty of that here too. However, “Crypt of the Vampire” actually gave Lee some material to chew on. A moment where, all but tears in his eyes, he asks why his daughter must suffer actually had me feeling some things. None of the other performances are that notable, though Adriana Ambesi and Ursula Davis both have some soulful eyes. The inevitable Bava comparisons arises in the torture sequence flashback, showing the witch being strung up and punished, in a way awfully similar to “Black Sunday.” The film also includes the somewhat underwhelming climax from Le Fanu's novel, which probably wasn't its best idea. Nevertheless, despite some obvious and apparent flaws, “Crypt of the Vampire” is still ridiculously in my wheelhouse. [8/10]

Ghosts: Three Miles Up

There's been so much self-mythologizing about the BBC's lengthy history of ghost stories that even I, an admitted convert to loving this shit, am a little tired of hearing about it. Clearly, however, the British Broadcasting Corporation has been aware of its own legacy of hushed, spooky horror for quite a while. In 1995, the network would debut an anthology that was simply called “Ghosts.” The brief, five episode series has never been released on disc but remains well-regarded by fans of this sort of thing. “Three Miles Up” was the penultimate episode, based on a short story by Elizabeth Jane Howard, and was directed by Lesley Manning. As in, the filmmaker behind “Ghostwatch,” my favorite low-key but creepy ghost story to emerge from British television. Meaning I had to check it out.

John decides to reconnect with Billy, his troubled younger brother. They rent a boat and go for a long excursion through the Fenlands, ostensibly as a bonding exercise. This is fitting, as both brothers carry around a boatload of trauma from their childhood with an abusive, withholding mother. That includes John essentially raising his brother himself and their mother dying under mysterious circumstances. Among the possessions of dear ol' mum they find is a whistle, which Billy thoughtlessly blows. Shortly after setting up the river, they discover a young lady on the shore. Both men feel attracted to her, the rivalry between the brothers heating up. At the same time, their journey up the river seems to keep going, the duo's destination always “three miles up” from their current location.

All ghost stories are about the dead refusing to stay underground, a fitting metaphor for unresolved childhood hang-ups and sibling rivalry. John and Billy often bicker, their familiarity with one another colored by years of resentment and pain. Billy insists he was always mom's favorite, John shooting back that he was the one always watching after his brother. That makes the soggy, overgrown fens a very fitting setting for such a story. Throughout “Three Miles Up,” faces and objects either emerge from the dark waters or sink into it. Much like bad memories or deeply buried memories floating up out of the subconscious. The deeper down the river they go, the comparisons to the mythological Styx all too obvious, the more the past comes to life around them. The final image of the episode is nicely chilling, an appropriate visualization of the idea of both men being swallowed up from that which they attempt to forget. 

“Three Miles Up” is also really slow. Once again, this is a prickly story devoted to two characters who don't like each other, arguing about their past. The appearance of the woman is an especially Freudian intrusion into this uneasy balance. She's both a romantic object for the men as well as a stand-in for their bitter mother. That's a reveal easily foreseen. While slowly entombing dread is the obvious goal here, the episode moving at the same pace as the sleepy boat ride makes it a little harder to be sucked in. Still, there is a dreary ambiance to this one, supported by the perpetually overcast British weather. It's more sad than scary, more tragic than chilling, but still quite well done. [7/10]

 

Friday the 13th: The Series: Bottle of Dreams

After spending a whole season hunting down the devil's playthings, Jack decides to throw a little party for Ryan and Micki. They get dressed up and pop a bottle of wine. That's when a weird guy in a turban delivers an ancient Egyptian canoptic jar. As they attempt to place the jar in the vault, Ryan and Micki are envelope in fumes from inside it. They begin to experience nightmares of their most frightening encounters, a personal hell that will ultimately end in their deaths. Jack stands up up stairs, inviting a friend named Rashid to help him undo this curse. This will mean confronting the spirit of Lewis Vendredi once again, as well as his own fears and regrets. 

Another episode set largely within the antiques shop, about the trio trying to unwind after capturing so many cursed items, is a fun idea for a season finale. Unfortunately, that set-up is soon passed over in favor of that most despised of cost-saving measures for old TV shows: The clip show. Bringing back some of the evil doodads for cameos is a great idea, as it deepens the sense of history and continuity the show has. Unfortunately, the minute the camera zoomed in on the demon doll from episode one and started replaying footage, I could tell what we were getting here. Yes, about half of the run time here is made up of recycled scenes from past installments. I hope I don't disappoint anybody by admitting that I fast-forwarded through the reused clips. Some of the clips chosen are also a bit questionable. I still think the doll episode was pretty cheesy, while agreeing that “Scarecrow” and the Dracula one were highlights. 

Clip shows are usually totally disposable episode that can be easily skipped. Maybe all too aware of that stigma, the “Friday the 13th” crew decided to also drop some essential lore in this episode. Here, we learn that Jack used to have a son, with psychic powers of his own, who died while trying to help someone. This episode also has Uncle Lewis reappearing. It's funny that the first episode established Lewis as ultimately remorseful about his mission to spread evil in the world, while every subsequent appearance has him being a willing minion of the devil. I don't mind too much, as watching R.G. Armstrong be evil is consistently amusing. I also like the minimalist but well done otherworldly sets used in the back half. It's nothing but a black backdrop with some dramatic lighting but it works. Certainly works better than the cheesy, stereotypical “laser” effects used a little later on. 

That puts “Bottle of Dreams” in an interesting place, half-way between the laziest way to pad out a season order and feeling like a proper finale to the last twenty-five episodes. I don't know if the episode can entirely overcome the inherent weaknesses of the clip-heavy format but I still think this one is okay. In fact, while the quality of “Friday the 13th: The Series” can vary wildly from episode to episode, I mostly found myself enjoying this first season. Like many shows of this nature, the chemistry between the central players has caused me to slowly become invested in them. While the gimmick of the week may or may not be lame, I simply enjoy hanging out with Jack, Ryan, and Micki. Yeah, I do think I'm going to check out the rest of this series. It's sometimes silly or limp but it's also the kind of old show I would've gotten really into as a kid. Ideal nostalgic October viewing, in other words. [Bottle of Dreams: 6/10] [Friday the 13th: The Series: Season One: 7/10]

CHUCK'S ROUNDHOUSE: An Eye for an Eye (1981)

Mr. Norris' previous three motion pictures were all produced and distributed by American Cinema Releasing, proving to be some of the low-budget company's most successful films. Unfortunately, as is too often the case, the studio overextended itself by trying out some bigger budget projects. A few flops and expensive re-shoots on “I, the Jury” led American Cinema Releasing to close their doors by 1981. Chuck was on a roll though and would have no reason to slow down his one-a-year pace. He simply roundhouse kicked his way over to Avco-Embassy, a company that had their name on so many cult favorites in the eighties. In no time at all, he was right at work on “An Eye for an Eye,” the Chuck Norris vehicle of 1981 How does it stand up to those that came before and after?

Once again, Chuck plays a city cop on the narcotics beat. He's Detective Sean Kane and, along with his partner Dave, they are meeting an informant in a dark alley. It turns out to be a set-up, Dave getting shot, crushed by a speeding car, and burned alive. In a vengeful rage, Kane immediately hunts down the shooter and punches him out an apartment window. The driver of the car remains unidentified and Kane turns in his badge, haunted by the memories. It also haunts Dave's widow, a respectable TV reporter named Linda Chan. She digs into the case further, uncovering something that gets her pursued by a giant Asian man. She calls Sean in a panic before being brutally strangled to death by her attacker. Sean teams up with Linda's dad, a martial arts master who taught him how to fight, and takes the law into his own hands. They soon uncover that the Triads are running an international drug running operation out of the city and it's connected with some powerful names

The first act of “An Eye for an Eye” resembles a darker, gritter type of action/crime movie than what you usually expect from a Chuck Norris flick. When Dave is murdered – the first of several times Terry Kiser would appear as a corpse in an eighties movie – there's a close-up on the body's burned, bloodied face. Afterwards, Kane is driven into such a rage that he's pointing his gun at old ladies in the hallway. There's a visible pissed-off aura radiating from Chuck in these scenes that is intense and different from the kind of roles he's played up to this point. This leads into the sequence of a terrified heroine being pursued by Professor Toru Tanaka, all his mass squeezed into a turtle neck and propped up on one elevated shoe. It's a surprisingly tense chase, ending with a shot of Tanaka's fist exploding through a door like it's Jason Voorhees' machete. I found myself wondering if “An Eye for an Eye” was going to continue in this mold, bringing some slasher energy to its gritty inner city setting. 

I would have liked to have seen a little more of that but this grim first act doesn't really represent what “An Eye for an Eye” is like. Instead, the film immediately veers in a much lighter direction. I guess a few weeks off from the force is enough to mellow Kane out, cause he almost seems like a different character in these scenes. He has an adorable dog, who has a habit of running off with his shirts. This is the focus of several scenes, including when he brings his love interest home. That love interest would be Heather, played by Maggie Cooper. Her and Norris have actual chemistry, better than the leading ladies in his prior movies. When he does things like carry a stack of VHS tapes or promises her she'll be safe in his home, it actually comes across as sweet. There is some tonal whiplash from swinging so hard between a gritty action flick and a cutesy romantic comedy but, weirdly, it works.

 

That's the mood “An Eye for an Eye” operates in for most of the rest of its runtime. Chuck cracks a few quibs here and one actually got a laugh out of me. Most of the film pairs him with Mako, as John Chan. It's another example of the obviously Japanese actor playing a Chinese character. (Professor Toru Tanaka, who was of Hawaiian/Chinese lineage in real life despite his stereotypically Japanese stage name, is as well.) However, Mako slips into the role of a martial arts master really easily, to the point that I'm surprised he didn't do it more often. Either he's doing some of these throws and tumbles himself or the stunt team did a good job of matching him. Either way, he has an amusing gimmick where he always criticizes Kane's martial arts, no matter how much he just saved his ass. The two do not tag along with each other for the whole movie, “An Eye for an Eye” stopping just short of being a proper buddy cop action flick. However, I would have happily watched a whole movie of Mako being Chuck's smart-ass sensai type as they fight the bad guys together. 

This is another Norris vehicle that seeks to compensate for any lack of charisma the star might have by filling out the supporting cast with reliable performers. Aside from Mako, Richard Roundtree shows up as the police chief. Definitely needed a few more scenes of him gruffly reading the cowboy cop the riot act. Christopher Lee plays the head of the network, a role the script does a very poor job of disguising is villainous. Mostly because they cast Count Dracula in the part. Stock though the role may be, Lee was a master at elevating nothing parts to grand poetry. An exchange he has about his preference for Asian woman drips with sinister intent that I don't think a lesser performer could have sold with the same weird level of dignity. Matt Clark, another instantly recognizable but not always easy to name character actor, also has a memorable part. If nothing else, he gets the grisliest death scene in the whole movie. 

After his first few films almost seemed to apologize for being martial arts movie, the eighties finally let Chuck Norris fight more than a few times in each of his flicks. This trend continues with “An Eye for an Eye,” which features some excellent action over all. The showdown between him, Mako, and a horde of Triad enforcers is very well done. Chuck's trademark moves, not only the roundhouse kicks but when he delivers multiple blows in quick succession or trips someone up by hooking his leg around their necks, all get a big workout here. The gag of kicking some bad guys off a railing or cliff is repeated a few times and works nicely. The proper finale of the film is the showdown with Toru Tanaka. It's a stand-out because Chuck actually gets his ass kicked during it, tossed across the room repeatedly. Much like “The Octagon,” the finale doesn't merely focus on Norris kicking and punching his way through the villain's army. There's plenty of that – an amusing beat-down takes place on a pool diving board – but throws in some shoot-outs and explosions too. Basically giving the audience as big of a bang for their buck as possible. 

If you go back and look at the reviews of “An Eye for an Eye,” you find a succession of critics saying that it's simply another Chuck Norris movie, doing all the same things his other films have done. This is basically true. If you aren't already a fan of this strain of bullshit, you are unlikely to find much compelling here. However, “An Eye for an Eye” actually presents some interesting tonal shifts that keep the same old kicking and fighting more compelling than usual. When combined with some strong action choreography and a supporting cast full of familiar faces that you are always happy to see, it makes this one go down real smooth. [7/10]

[THE CHUCK OF NORRIS: 2 outta 5]
[] Facial Hair
[] Jumps or Kicks Through a Window or Wall
[X] Performs Spin Kick or Spin Punch to Enemy's Face
[X] Shows Off His Hairy Chest
[] Sports Some Cowboy Getup

 

 

Halloween 2025: September 26th

 

Lost Souls (2000)

I'm glad that we, as a culture, decided to forgive Winona Ryder. Considering the vile acts male movie stars commit,  their careers intact afterwards, a little shop-lifting truly doesn't feel like a big deal. Hell, it's practically morally justified. As clear as that is in retrospect, the lovely Miss Ryder was truly having a downswing in her career at the turn of the millennium. What was supposed to be her big Oscar moment got overshadowed by another actress. She was the love interest in a lame Adam Sandler movie and a lame Richard Gere weepy. And then there was “Lost Souls.” It probably sounded like a solid career move, as the directorial debut of the cinematographer of “Schindler's List.” However, nobody seemed very enthusiastic about the script and the test screenings were disastrous. A wave of religious horror movies coming out in 1999 – all hoping to cash-in on Y2K Revelations anxiety – led to the film being shelved for over a year. It finally dropped in October of 2000... Opposite a re-release of the biggest Satanic Panic thriller ever. Almost as if the studio was intentionally trying to make sure nobody paid attention to this thing. By that point, Ryder was no longer contractually obligated to promote the film, adding to the stink of failure around the whole project. After that, “Lost Souls” was quickly forgotten by normal people. I am not a normal person, however, and promised to review the movie while talking about “Bless the Child” last year. Well, consider the prophecy fulfilled. 

As a teenager, Maya Larkin survived an exorcism, Father Lareaux driving a demon out of her body. Since then, she has become Lareaux's assistant whenever they are needed. The two arrive at a mental hospital, where an epileptic man and family annihilator has been obsessively writing down numbers. The exorcism is a failure, Father Lareaux left catatonic and the victim stuck in a coma. Maya decodes the man's writing and discovers the name Peter Kelson. That is a lawyer and writer famous for his true crime books on the nature of evil. Peter is having strange dreams and odd experiences. A priest attempts to kill him. Maya slips him an audio recording of the exorcism but Peter can't hear anything on it. The same recording pushes his elderly neighbor to suicide. After meeting Maya again, Peter becomes convinced that his life is the result of a Satanic conspiracy. At midnight, on his 33rd birthday, he will become possessed by the spirit of Satan himself. Maya sets out to stop this apocalyptic chain of events before it is too late.

"Lost Souls" is proof positive that gathering a bunch of talented people together is not enough to prevent the making of a stinky dog turd. The narrative's stakes are about as high as they can get, the good guys racing to stop the creation of the Antichrist before he can get the End Times rolling. Despite that, "Lost Souls" is utterly bereft of tension. The script flip-flops between Maya and Peter as protagonists, the indecisiveness stalling a sense of anticipation. The details of Peter's unholy origins are revealed during a dispassionate conversation, not as a traumatic flashback but as a list of names and events. His shock seems minimal. The movie quickly progresses past the revelation that everyone in the male lead's life has been part of a demonic cult determined to bring the Devil into his body. Most of the exorcisms take place off-screen and the arrival of Satan occurs in a literal blink of an eye. Supporting characters and subplots pop in and out, until they are dismissed. A good example of "Lost Souls'" complete unwillingness to generate any excitement is the climax. A Black Mass gathers to crown Peter as the Father of All Lies. A couple of people get shot and then the heroes escape during a scene transition, what would normally be the most important part of the story occurring completely off-screen. 

As far as I can tell, "Lost Souls" is like this because nobody involved wanted to make an actual horror movie. In one of the few interviews Winona gave concerning the film, she refers to it as "more of a supernatural thriller." Director Janusz Kamiński said the film was "not the most ideal project." After it received a rare F grade from Cinema Score, New Line ordered reshoots to make the movie "scarier." This suggests nobody was trying to make a scary movie in the first place. Reshoots like that almost never work, right? You can spot with ease where these new moments were inserted. Such as when Maya has a vision of a knife wielding maniac in a melting bathroom or a blurry sequence of a man's arms and legs cracking and twisting around. If that sounds like a bad cliche, it's far from the only one present. A true groaner of a moment involves a little girl whispering blasphemous statements, amid jerky editing and digital distortion. The only cliche I find more tiresome than that is attempts to emulate the head-bopping demons of "Jacob's Ladder." "Lost Souls" employs that one too, alongside heavy metal music video style glimpses of a screeching, twitching exorcism. 

"Lost Souls" being such a terminally dull experience is all the more frustrating because of the talent assembled. Based on his work with Spielberg, Julian Schnabel, and Vanilla Ice, Kamiński clearly has an eye for visuals. Mauro Fiore – who would eventually win an Oscar of his own for "Avatar" – is credited with cinematography here. "Lost Souls" received some positive notices for its photography but I don't personally see it. This is a gloomy, grey looking motion picture, overly fond of washed-out colors and dimly lit interiors. Reliable performers like John Hurt, Philip Baker Hall, and Elias Koteas are lined up for a selection of interchangeable supporting rows. It's always a joy to gaze into Winona's giant anime girl eyes but she spends the whole movie looking for some sort of emotion to latch onto. This mostly results in her staring ahead, mouth slightly agape, eyes wide with dull surprise. The character's sole defining trait is being a devout Catholic, her faith strictly being an informed and never displayed attribute. She shares zero chemistry with the bland Ben Chaplin as Peter. I think there's supposed to be some sort of romantic chemistry between the two characters but there's no sign of it. There's a mildly clever reveal concerning a hidden pentacle, a brief blip of surprise in an otherwise monotonous story. 

"Lost Souls" is easily the lamest of turn-of-the-millennium Satan movies. "End of Days" is low-tier Arnold but has one or two moments, a cool special effect or a memorable quote. "Bless the Child" is bad but in an occasionally funny, interesting way that reflects the bat-shit beliefs of its author. I don't remember anything about "Stigmata," so I guess I need to write about that one next September. Regardless, you could detect some degree of passion, no matter how misplaced, in those productions. "Lost Souls" is seemingly the result of bored artists showing up, punching a clock, getting a paycheck, and expending not an ounce of themselves in the process. The last scene is so blunt and anticlimactic, furthering the feeling that everybody merely wanted to get this done and move on with their lives. Which is what I shall proceed to do. In their quest to reclaim every studio horror flick of the nineties, and in-between re-issues of "Child's Play" and "The Thing," Scream Factory gave this one a spiffy Blu-Ray. Which did nothing to redeem its reputation. May these souls remain lost. [2/10]
 

Tilbury (1987)

It is a mythological concept that exists all throughout Scandinavia but is practically unknown elsewhere. A witch fashions a creation out of bones, stolen wool or hair, nail clippings, or wood shavings She hides it between her breasts and grows it with the wine she spits out when taking communion. It grows into a weird little creature that sneaks out at night, sucking the near-by cows dry. Once gorged on milk, it returns home and vomits up the stolen goods into a churn, the witch using it to make cursed butter. As a reward, the beastie is allowed to suckle from a secret nipple on the sorceress' inner thigh. In Sweden, it usually takes the form of a hare or cat and is called a bjära. The Norwegians imagine the beast as a living ball of wool known as a trollnøste. The Estonian kratt is made from household items and brought to life with blood but still steals for its master. Latvian witches had the pūķis, a small dragon that dragged home gold and grain. In Iceland, however, this particular creature is a gruesome looking worm-thing called a tilberi. In 1987, Icelandic filmmaker Viðar Víkingsson would direct an hour long television movie inspired by this same mythology. Severin would bring this “Tilbury” to its widest audience yet as part of its folk horror box set a few years back. 

The year is 1940 and the place is the Icelandic countryside. Auðun is a young man, a swimmer. He still harbors an attachment to his boyhood crush, Gudrún. After receiving news that he's been recruited into the war effort,  Gudrún's pastor father asks Auðun to check on her. Arriving at the British controlled military base,  Auðun discovers that the girl he knew has grown into a promiscuous young woman. She's carrying on an affair with a married British officer named Tilbury. The eccentric, impish man seems to have a strange sway over Gudrún. Auðun seemingly spies him sucking on her thigh and puking up green butter. As Auðun grows increasingly obsessed with his childhood friend, he becomes more and more convinced that her lover is a monster from Icelandic folklore. 

“Tilbury” begins with a short prologue, explaining the specifics of the folkloric creature its story revolves around. The sequence focuses closely on the witch's breasts, thighs, and her spitting out the sacrament. It brings a distinctly sexual nature to the ritual. When  Auðun spies the officer Tilbury with his lips on his crush's thigh, it is similarly provocative. Especially when these meetings are done in secret places or under tables, leaving slimy residue behind. It's a shock to the boy to see the girl he likes being so wantonly sexual with a creepy little pervert. The more we see of Auðun's childhood recollections, however, the less wholesome they seem. He repeatedly revisits the image of the young girls teasing him by kicking their legs over his head as they're on swings. Is he looking up their skirts or laying down under them in preparation for...? Well, when paired with the tilberi's acts of suckling and vomiting – his lover and creator being the same figure, that he calls “Mommy” – it all starts to feel very kinky. Auðun's resentment of Officer Tilbury is clearly based in jealousy. At the same time, it starts to feel like he equally resents him and Gudrún for being willing to express their sexuality in an open, wanton way. 

“Tilbury” is probably most easily read as a film about sexual repression, a tightly wound young man suffering the culture shock of a more modern, sexually liberated couple. At the same time, there are more international concerns on Víkingsson's mind. The British presence in Iceland is shown as something of an unnatural intrusion, the foul-mouthed Brits often bullying and harassing Auðun. It makes him an outsider in his own country. Chocolate bars are made from the tilberi's green butter. Later on, the film connects this with crass corporate capitalism coming to Iceland, furthering the feeling that the supernatural threat represents the corrosive effects of American excess. Among the soldiers is another swimmer who gets imprisoned for possibly being a Nazi. He obviously sucks but he's also the first person to correctly identify Tilbury as a monster. Which makes me wonder what the hell the filmmaker meant by several Menorahs being present when the villain goes fully demonic. Needless to say, there's something deeper being hinted at here and I don't think it's antisemitic? 

While certain elements of “Tilbury” left me uncertain of how to feel, I still enjoyed it a lot. In general, the film has a delightfully light surreal touch to it. When we are greeted to bizarre sights – like our hero stepping from a swimming pool into a sauce that is also a military watch tower – you're left wondering if you're watching a dream sequence or a reflection of objective reality. The most delightful mixture of these elements occurs during a stylish shot dance sequence, the protagonist's anxieties playing out as a musical number. This is furthered with the bizarre sights we're shown, most of which involve the tilberi's very antisocial behavior. The amount of green butter puke in this movie pushes it into the realm of gross-out comedy at times, which I mean as a compliment. Karl Ágúst Úlfsson has such an uncomfortable greasiness to him in the eponymous role, that you totally believe he's a milk-sucking goblin. The special effects are extremely lo-fi yet the persistently off-beat tone the movie cultivates makes that work.

That might be my primary disappointment with “Tilbury.” Most of the oral tradition and folk art about tilberi depict them as grotesque worm-like creatures. The replicas on display at the Icelandic Museum of Sorcery and Witchcraft recall lengths of intestines, pre-mature fetuses, and massive globs of belly button lint. The creature in the movie, meanwhile, is mostly depicted as a human being with some impish features. Not that I'd expect a low-budget television film to truly have the money and resources to depict a creature that weird anyway. Mostly, it makes me wish that we had way more movies about this particular monsters, to allow for more cinematic interpretations of them. This “Tilbury” is still cool though, an oddly funny and funnily odd tale of witchcraft, sexual hang-ups, World War II, and globs of green butter. [7/10]

 

Faerie Tale Theater: The Boy Who Left Home to Find Out About the Shivers

Presumably following the logic that people spend money on their kids, premium cable channels in the eighties produced a surprising amount of kids' show. In September of 1982, Showtime would begin broadcasting “Faerie Tale Theatre.” Produced and hosted by the fittingly whimsical Shelley Duvall, the series often featured A-list celebrities as guest stars. (And sometimes had high profile names behind the camera too, with Francis Ford Coppola and Tim Burton directing two episodes.) Usually, this was in-service of doing wacky and comical retellings of the most well-known Grimm's fairy tales. Occasionally, however, the show would present a more obscure story. Such as “The Boy Who Left Home to Find Out About the Shivers,” based on the even more awkwardly entitled “The Story of the Youth Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was.” As you might have guessed from the title, this was essentially the program's Halloween special, presenting a tone a bit more ghoulish than your standard modernized take on a fairy tale. 

That means it's still less gruesome than the original text, which might be the origin of the hoary horror cliché of spending the night in a haunted house to win a monetary prize. The titular character is Martin, the son of a superstitious carpenter. The boy has never experienced fear, not because he's exceptionally brave but because he's too dim-witted to know better. The boy is sent to ring the church bell at night, a set-up for a prank by the local deacon. This only results in the man getting his leg broken, leading to Martin being kicked out of his father's home. He eventually wanders towards an inn in the land of Transylvania. King Vladimir, the ruler of this land, is staying there with his daughter, Princess Amanda. That's because the castle is so beset by ghosts that nobody is willing to live there. The king makes Martin the same offer he's presented to several lads before him: If he can last three nights in the haunted castle without dying or being scared off, he will win riches and the princess' hand. Martin agrees to the task, despite having no use for money, because he hopes he'll finally be frightened for the first time in his life. However, the boy's cluelessness once again makes him difficult to startled, no matter how many spectres and zombies appear before him. 

The cast list for any given episode of “Faerie Tale Theatre” sometimes feels like if every part in a “Saturday Night Live” sketch was played by a celebrity guest hosts. A not-especially boy-ish thirty year old Peter MacNicol plays the title “boy.” Christopher Lee is King Vlad, explicitly identified as the son of Vlad the Impaler. David Warner is the innkeeper. Vincent Price is the narrator. Most randomly of all, Frank Zappa plays the king's hunchbacked assistant. And would you believe that Zappa gives the funniest performance? He never speaks and instead silently performs physical gags, like smashing a window when asked to let in some fresh air or rubbing a stolen apple on his arm pit. Lee mostly plays it straight, with just a bit more goofiness in his usual style. MacNicol is playing a very silly character but otherwise does it straight, playing a character whose exceptional courage actually extends from a genuine inability to process when he's in danger. 

Despite the Hollywood cast and quite detailed sets, “Faerie Tale Theatre” was still somewhat shot like a “Muppet Show” segment. The camera work is largely stationary. The digital effects are exceedingly cheesy. The writing still feels a little like a comedy sketch stretched to a full hour. Which is not to say I didn't enjoy “The Boy Who Left Hoe to Find Out About the Shivers.” Anytime the episode commits to capturing a non-threatening but suitably spooky haunted house ambiance, it's a ton of fun. The old castle setting looks like a bitchin' small time amusement park fun house. Set pieces involving a pendulum swinging into place or a revolving door feel right out of a classic “Abbott & Costello Meet the Monsters” flick. There's a pretty cool looking Grim Reaper and blinking gargoyle. The highlight of the episode is clearly a sequence where a horde of zombie-like spirits emerge, eventually playing a game of ten pins with skulls and femurs. That sounds like a great party to me! The finale features Christopher Lee shooting some extremely unconvincing laser beams out of his hands, before the punchline of the entire enterprise – the only thing that scares the boy without fear is the thought of getting married, hey-oooooo – arrives right when you expect. I would've absolutely been obsessed with this if I had seen it as a kid. [7/10]

 

The Addams Family: Cat Addams

We haven't seen Kitty Kat, the Addams' pet lion, in a while but the writers haven't forgotten about them. “Cat Addams” is kicked off when Grandmama notices that the feline is acting lethargic and not eating. Gomez quickly comes to the conclusion that Kitty Kat is not sick but rather lonely. The Addams decide to hide out on safari and seek out the help of the family witch doctor, Dr. Mbogo, in locating a mate for Kitty Kat. Unfortunately, this does not work, as Kitty's dad apparently ate Mbojo's dad. Instead, the family calls up a veterinarian called Dr. Gunderson. Gunderson arrives for a house call, assuming he is helping out a regular house cat. When he's terrified by the lion, Gomez and Morticia assumes that the guy is just suffering from a lack fo confidence. They enact a scheme to boost the terrified vet's self-esteem. 

Like “The Great Treasure Hunt” before it, this is another episode of “The Addams Family” that starts off pursuing a plot point far outside the budgetary limits of a sixties sitcom. The idea of Gomez and the gang going on safari and trying to pair Kitty Kat up with a girlfriend would probably be a lot of fun... Sadly, this show couldn't afford to have real actors in the same room with an actual lion. The brief moment where Dr. Gunderson has to interact with the lion is achieved by having stock footage of a lion – clearly not the same one that usually depicts Kitty – awkwardly inserted into the Addams' basement. The producers couldn't even afford to show Dr. Mbogo in his hut, instead using brief reused footage from his first appearance in “Uncle Fester's Illness.”

Instead, the majority of “Cat Addams” is about guest star Marty Ingels as Dr. Gunderson reacting with terror and bafflement to the Addams' antics. Yes, it's yet another episode like that. My familiarity with Mr. Ingels' work only extends to his voice work in crappy old Hanna-Barbera cartoons like “The Grape Ape Show” and “Pac-Man.” (He previously did another sitcom with John Astin.) If I had to guess, I would assume that playing over-the-top cowards like this was part of his regular shtick. Regardless, he does make for an amusing presence. The back-and-forth he has with Cousin Itt and an illness feigning Fester does make for an honest chuckle or two. This episode is also notable for Lurch appearing instantly when summoned, the butler producing a Tsetsee fly right from his jacket, and Astin and Carolyn Jones giving each other some crazy bedroom eyes during one sequence. Pretty standard stuff but, hey, I like it. [7/10]

Halloween 2025: September 6th

 

Final Destination (2000)

It started, as all things do, with an idea. Jeffrey Reddick heard the old urban legend about a woman telling her daughter not to get on a plane, a warning the girl heeds. The next day, the plane the girl was supposed to be on crashes, her mother's premonition having saved her life. (Or he saw "Sole Survivor," a 1984 horror flick inspired by the same story.) Reddick broke into Hollywood at fourteen, after sending his "A Nightmare on Elm Street" fanfic to New Line Cinema and badgering Rob Shaye about it after the script was rejected. At the time, he was trying to get into TV and thought this story could be the basis for an episode of "The X-Files." The spec script he wrote never made it to the "X-Files" writers' room but his friends at New Line read it and saw the potential for a good movie. Ironically, the script that was now called "Final Destination" ended up in the hands of James Wong and Glen Morgan, a duo best known for writing some of the freakier episodes of "The X-Files." Wong made his directorial debut with "Final Destination," which became a sleeper hit for New Line at the start of the new millennium. This would kick-off a new horror franchise for the House That Freddy Built. 

High school senior Alex Browning is preparing to leave on a class trip to Paris, his best friend Tod in tow. A small mechanical malfunction aboard the plane sets off a catastrophic chain reaction that ends with all the passengers dying in a massive explosion... Or so Alex sees in an apparent psychic vision. Once minor details from his promotion start to come true, Alex freaks out. He starts a fight with class bully Carter that results in the two of them – along with Tod, Carter's girlfriend, teacher Miss Lewton, Alex's crush Clear, and some random guy named Billy – getting thrown off the plane. Afterwards, they all witness the Boeing going up in a massive fireball, Alex's premonition having saved their lives. However, an eerie feeling continues to float over the survivors. Tod dies shortly afterwards in a bizarre bathroom accident, that is mistaken for a suicide. Alex becomes convinced that all of them were meant to die on that plane and now Death itself is claiming each of them, one by one. When Carter's girlfriend and their teacher die in similarly strange mishaps, Alex becomes obsessed with what the mortician William Bludworth calls "Death's design." He seeks to interrupt the preordained series of events and save Clear, Carter, and his own life before Death comes for them again.

In one roundabout way or another, most horror movies are about the fear of death. All of our lives are destined to end someday, an inescapable fate none of us can avoid or have much control over. "Final Destination" is a horror movie about this idea in a much more literal way than most. An unexplained intervention prevents Alex from dying in a horrible accident but this is only a brief reprieve, the inevitability of death sure to catch up with him eventually. Rather than get too existential about it, "Final Destination" takes this idea in the far sillier direction of death being a personified concept with a strict plan that gets extra creative and vindictive when his carefully constructed pattern is interrupted. Alex becomes an obsessive conspiracy theorist type, seeing secret codes and patterns in the random events around him that he interprets as further evidence of "Death's design." If only he can decipher this code – presented almost literally as a puzzle, after the accident that caused the plane explosion reveals the order everyone was originally destined to die in – maybe he can prevent these events from happening. That this conviction makes Alex, functionally, indistinct from a raving lunatic is probably the closest thing "Final Destination" has to a wider thematic point. We're all going to die, sooner or later, and trying to outrun that fate leads only to madness. Better to live your life without agonizing too much about how you're gonna die. Or at least, as Clear does, channel those anxieties into personal art pieces rather than become a schizophrenic who sees a malevolent force eager to act all around him. 

Rather than examine this idea from a philosophical direction, Wong and Morgan's film takes Alex's position. The script seems to operate from the perspective that death can be escaped, if only you read the clues right. Following that thought, "Final Destination" is a film littered with subconscious warnings about the characters' ultimate fate. The opening credits look over the model airplanes in Alex's bedroom, hinting at the soon-to-come crash. Before Miss Lewton is killed by an improbably falling butcher knife, a stained glass window over her shoulder depicts a sword floating above her head. A speeding bus or flying piece of shrapnel are preceded by reflections in windows or flashes of lights, signs that these events are forthcoming. Wong and his team are clearly seeking to create an ominous feeling, in hopes that the viewer will feel as paranoid as Alex does, surrounded by a sense that a horrible accident could claim your life at any minute. Which, I suppose, is indeed a possibility. These frequent visual reminders are paired with a melodramatic score from Shirley Walker – a composer best known for her work in the also exaggerated superhero genre – and a generally credulous tone throughout. 

It's a bit overblown and more than a little bit silly, which is probably why an undercurrent of absurdity runs through "Final Destination." The film takes everything that happens very seriously despite it all being quite ridiculous, the dissonance creating a subtext of campy anticipation. I think Wong and company are in on the joke too. That the violent accidents in "Final Destination" happen as the result of elaborate chain reactions, a spontaneous Rube Goldberg machine that leads to somebody's grisly death, feels like a punchline to a steadily built-up joke. This is especially true for the series of unlikely events that result in a cord wrapping around a neck or a knife driven into a chest by a falling chair, combinations of such unlikeliness that you kind of have to laugh at them. When Kristen Cloke gets creamed by a randomly speeding bus or Sean William Scott is decapitated, it plays out like a physical gag. That "Final Destination" is only one step removed from a Raimian "splatstick" gore comedy doesn't prevent it from generating a grim tension in a few sequences. Most notably the opening plane crash, which piles misfortunes atop each other in a suitably out-of-control fashion that makes the viewer feel as caught up in this disaster as the characters. Or a mildly tense set piece of a car stopped on train tracks, which captures a little bit of that same panicked sensation. 

The minute it's revealed that a character has the last name of Hitchcock, it's clear "Final Destination" is one of those movies that sprinkles in homages to horror history. Miss Lewton's first name is Val, about as blatant a reference as you can get. Browning, Chaney, Dreyer, Weine, Murnau and Schreck are the other familiar names tossed around. Despite these shout-outs to the classic era, "Final Destination" focusing on elaborate death scenes makes it more like a slasher film. This is also evident in the "Dawson's Creek"-ready cast of photogenic young actors. The performances range from vacant to silly. Bright-eyed Devon Sawa as Alex gets increasingly sweaty as the material gets broader. Kerr Smith as Carter is a blustering cartoonish bully, while Sean William Scott is playing a slightly only less silly version of his “American Pie” character. Ali Larter, as Clear, and Kerr Smith as Carter, as Tod, are mostly stiff and unconvincing. The character remain archetypal in their simplicity, as they typically do in a slasher, though the movie at least gets points for not being as outwardly dismissive towards them as a lot of similar films are. Tony Todd's character exists to deliver some exposition but Todd was such an artist with screen presence that he makes the goofy dialogue sound sinister and impressive. 

By the way, “Final Destination'” origins as an “X-Files” spec script is still evident. The FBI agents floating around the margins of the story seem to suspect Alex might be a serial killer offing his friends or a terrorist who blew up the plane. The two have a scene, talking about whether the predictions of the future could exists, that you could easily slot Mulder and Scully into. It's not hard to imagine a version of this story with the investigator as the protagonists. Ending with a blunt cut-to-black that also operates as a pay-off to a sick joke, “Final Destination” takes the viewer out with a twisted smile on their face. It squanders a lot of potential with a shallow approach to its own ideas but remains a reasonably entertaining genre experience. Considering “Final Destination” came out during a time when slick “Scream” rip-offs made up a lot of the genre, the movie surely must've felt like a fresh approach at the time. It holds up fairly well. [7/10]

 

 

Meatcleaver Massacre (1977)

When future right-wing talk radio host and life-long hack Michael Medved named Edward D. Wood Jr. the “Worst Director of All Time” in 1980, he plucked the name out of obscurity and insured the filmmaker an undying cult following. Ed Wood doesn't merely have fans, he has devotees. I mean that almost literally, as Wood is at the center of a highly sarcastic but legally recognized religion. Wood archivists genuinely exist and they've unearthed lost works of his with some regularity. For example: It was long rumored that Wood had some involvement with 1976 trash-slasher “Meatcleaver Massacre” but, in 2022, cinematographer Roy H. Wagner confirmed that ol' Eddie boy basically directed the whole movie. That would make it the last Ed Wood movie, as he died three years later. First released as “Hollywood Meatcleaver Massacre,” the distributor later stitched on an introduction Christopher Lee had filmed for a totally unrelated project and chopped the “Hollywood” off the title. Now this utter obscurity is available on spiffy special edition Blu-Rays, both cuts bundled together and all cleaned up and full of special features. If only Ed had lived to seen it...

Professor Cantrell gives a lecture to his class about a Gaelic demon named Morak, said to be summoned to deliver bloody vengeance against those that have wronged another. Among Cantrell's class is Mason, an anti-social burn-out. That night, he meets up with his friends – long-haired hippy Sean, mechanic Dirk, sleaze ball Phil – and the group decides to pay Professor Cantrell a visit. Donning masks and wielding knives, they break into the man's house and brutally stab his wife and daughter to death. Contrell is left in a coma. From his hospital bed, his thoughts call out to Morak. Soon, Mason and his friends begin to experience bizarre hallucinations and nightmares. A demonic force is closing in and picking them off one by one. A police detective, who uncovered a triangular patch of cloth from Dirk's jacket at the crime scene, investigates.

In the same social media post where he confirmed that Wood directed most of the movie, Roy Wagner also revealed that shooting occurred over a four day period. This is evident, as the movie's narrative often operates as if it was made up along the way. We never learn anything about any of the character, all of them existing as thinly defined entities. Why Mason hates his college professor so much, or why he's such a belligerent psychopath in general, is never discussed. His friends seem to go along with the murderous plan on a whim. The plot, as it is, operates in an extremely simple, A-to-B fashion. This assholes kill a guy's family, he summons a demon to avenge them, and then they all die in supernatural ways. Despite that simplicity, “Meatcleaver Massacre” pads its slim 77 minute run time with lots of people walking around, hanging out in dingy apartments, or existing in various places of business. If you expect that subplot about the detective or the one guy's girlfriend working in a rub-and-tug massage parlor to amount to anything, you are definitely watching the wrong movie. 

Not that such a slapped-together production, with a paper-thin plot and non-existent characters, would be atypical for an Edward D. Wood Jr. movie. However, the director often paired his zero budget production values and nonsensical scripts with bizarre dialogue and a spunky, do-it-yourself flow. “Meatcleaver Massacre” mostly lacks these qualities, perhaps owing to Wood being a last minute replacement and a barely functioning alcoholic at the time. Occasionally, however, a bit of that old Wood-ian weirdness emerges. Such as in a hilarious sequence where Dirk seems to seriously consider slashing his wrist with a straight razor before glancing at his watch and shouting, “I'm gonna be late for work!” Or a customer in that sleazy sex shop being either a priest or a man posing as a priest. Another highly quotable line is a doctor in a mental institute looking in at a cackling patient and declaring “This is my first nut!” Before Morak takes out each guy, they have strange nightmares or visions. One of which involves wandering through a misty funeral home and a dead body wrapped in a white sheet on a beach. The long-haired hippy is taken out after wandering into the desert, the scene cut in such a matter that it looks like he's been killed by the leaves of an agave plant. So that's pretty funny. 

If “Meatcleaver Massacre” can be said to have any merits when taken as a stand-alone artifact, it is in the same way a lot of exploitation movies are: As an accidental time capsule of its time and place. There is a sequence, where Phil is walking down Sunset Avenue. The most famous landmark he passes is the Roxy Theater, which is advertising a late night screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” He also passes a lot of much sleazier venues and shops, showing pornography of varying degrees. Yes, “Meatcleaver Massacre” does have a little bit of that super greasy and washed-out atmosphere you find in extremely low budget and nasty grindhouse flicks of the time. There was definitely a Manson family influence on the home invasion premise, which was almost a decade out of date by the late seventies. However, the scraggly, long-haired, and polyestered actors – all of whom appear to be strung-out on one type of substance or another – does generate that seventies sense of nihilism. That the idealism of the sixties had failed and drugs and hedonism were all we got left with.  

This is interesting but not enough to make up for “Meatcleaver Massacre” mostly being a total nothing-burger of a movie. The close-ups of the weird-ass paintings seen throughout are fun. When Morak kills a guy with a car hood latch, that was mildly entertaining. However, the “Meatcleaver Massacre” experience is mostly summed up by the Christopher Lee bookends. Lee intoning grimly about pseudo-mystical mumbo-jumbo for six minutes sounds fun, like “In Search Of...” if it was hosted by Dracula and not Spock. In actuality though, the Lee sequences are flatly shot and rather monotonous. If you give Wood credit for the movie, you can smell the boozy fumes coming off the entire project. The other people behind the film were screenwriter Keith Burns, whose only other credit is a TV clip-show about Ernie Kovacs. The second credited writer is Ray Atherton. He mostly worked as a producer with credits like “F.A.R.T. The Movie,” video tapes collecting violent accident footage, and a documentary about L.A. queer culture starring a physically disabled tap dancer that later spawned an internet meme. Oh, he also played the guy who gets killed with the TV in “Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer.” All of which implies that the behind-the-scenes details of “Meatcleaver Massacre” – no one is massacred with a meat cleaver, by the way – are more interesting than the actual movie itself. [4/10]

Thriller: The Incredible Doktor Markesan

Boris Karloff hosted every episode of “Thriller,” of course, but he appeared as a character in the stories themselves a handful of times as well. Of these five appearances within “Thriller's” narratives, “The Incredible Doktor Markesan” is easily the best regarded. First Darren Dick York stars as Fred, a perpetually broke young man. Alongside his young wife, Molly, he drives to the estate of his rich uncle, Konrad. Konrad Markesan was a notable professor at the local college at one point and Fred and Molly hope he can help them find work, or at least provide them with a place to stay for a while. When the two arrive at the home, they find it dilapidated and slowly being consumed by the swamp around it. The house appears empty at first and, when Konrad finally does appear, his behavior is strange and his appearance is sickly. He allows the couple to stay in the home but under one condition: They must not roam around the house at night. He locks them into their bedroom every day at sundown to insure this. However, Molly and Fred are both curious about what's going on with Uncle Konrad. They soon break their promise to him and uncover that the old man has been performing unnatural experiments. Oh yeah, and that him and his work colleagues – also seen lurking around the house – have been dead for ten years. 

“Thriller” was a series that often succeeded in bringing a classic horror atmosphere to the small screen. “The Incredible Doktor Markesan” excels in this regard and it's not surprising once you read that it was directed by Robert Florey. That's the same guy who directed “Murders in the Rue Morgue,” among the foggiest of Universal's mist-strewn classic monster movies. Florey worked in almost every genre over his long career but was especially good at the macabre stuff. “The Incredible Doktor Markesan” is awash with smoky fog. The climax features an old family crypt, reeking with age and clouded in darkness. The setting is primarily a crumbling old mansion, filled with shadows and dust. When Karloff first appears the title character, it's with waxy flesh and massive bags under his eyes. He's the first of a handful of similarly sunken-eyed ghouls that show up. This classically spooky ambiance is supported by moody cinematography that often adopts askew or stylized camera angles and a score that layers on the quivering strings and shrill shrieks. Karloff, meanwhile, is at his most sinister as an ancient old man that moves between utterly zombified and surprisingly threatening.

That “The Incredible Doktor Markesan” has such incredible atmosphere makes up for a story that is fairly predictable. The episode is adapted from a script by frequent Lovecraft colleague August Derleth. While there's no cosmic horrors about in this one, the premise of a younger man discovering a disturbing family secret created through profane scientific experiments isn't that far off from something Howard Phillips might have written. The reveal that his uncle is an undead ghoul of some sort isn't that shocking and it takes Fred entirely too long to figure that out. In general, the episode is a bit heavy on the young couple bickering. 

However, there is something appealing about the classic set-up here, the “Bluebeard”-esque promise of comfort and security as long as someone simply doesn't explore further. The exact motivations of Markesan's experiments aren't revealed until the very end and remain a bit vague then too. The script works best when suggesting something weird and disturbing going on. Such as when Molly gets a glimpse of the old man forcing the other zombies to exhaustively repeat a speech praising him. Someone catching a glimpse of a weird, forbidden ritual that they don't understand but clearly realize they should not be seeing is a trope that almost always gives me the willies. Like most of the “Thriller” episodes I've seen, this does lead up to a properly chilling and surprisingly grim ending, which sends the viewer out on a fittingly creepy note. Doesn't hit quite as hard as “The Cheaters” or “The Hungry Glass” but still a nicely spooky hour of television. [7/10]

 

 

The Addams Family: Gomez, the People's Choice

An early season one episode of “The Addams Family” was entitled “Gomez, the Politician” but was actually about the patriarch of the eccentric family canvasing for another politician altogether. The idea was revisited with “Gomez, the People's Choice.” Upon receiving the tax bill for their home, Gomez and Morticia are disgusted to see their stately manor is only worth 84 dollars. They head to the mayor's office to demand to pay more, only for the glad-handing politician to offer to lower their bill instead. Gomez is outraged and, upon seeing his political rant, Morticia talks him into running for mayor. His bizarre ideas prove surprisingly appealing to the public and his campaign starts to gain steam. So much so that Gomez becomes too distracted by his new career to pay proper attention to his wife. Morticia and the rest of the family conspire to undo Gomez' latest ambitions. 

See, this is why the Addams Family are perhaps the only good millionaires: Not only do they pay their taxes, they demand to pay more than they owe! I can't imagine Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg ever trying to get into politics on that platform. As you'd probably expect, “The Addams Family” was not a series made for serious political commentary. Gomez' campaign is built entirely on nonsensical slogans. He spews a bunch of cliches and has Whizzo – the family super-computer introduced in “The Addams Family Splurges" – spit out topics for him to rant on. That's a surprisingly relevant message in our post-truth era, when a far less charming billionaire lunatic spouting completely inane bullshit somehow swindled his way into the White House twice. The Trump parallels become far more obvious in the second half. When Morticia and the others start attempting to sabotage Gomez' career with one scandal after another, his opponent realizes this will only make more popular with voters and immediately concedes. Very ahead of its time, that observation was. 

The middle stretch of this episode does feel a little limp. The beginning – of the family all engaged in their wacky hobbies before the tax bill ruins their day – is a solid gag. The last third features some really funny bits. Morticia rattling off a series of French phrases that go unnoticed by her husband, consumed in his political rhetoric, and getting increasingly aghast at what is happening is a wonderful moment. As is Morticia's attempt to portrayed a battered wife, which falls apart the minute her husband starts kissing her arm, turning her cries of anguish into ones of ecstasy. See, the wacky relationships between these character is why I love this show! That same sequence features a good joke about Uncle Fester pretending to be an escaped criminal. I also like the reveal concerning where the Addams got the signatures needed to approve his political run. Needed more silliness like that and less scenes of Whizzo the computer blowing confetti and shooting steam. (Especially not when there's a suitably funny series of gags about smoking earlier in the episode.) [6/10]