Halloween 2017: October 25

The Wraith (1986)

I'm a big fan of the “phantom vehicle” troupe. Long periods of our lives are spent in and around cars. A lot of people die in them too. So it's always surprised me that there are fewer horror films about these modes of transportation than you'd think. “Christine” and “The Car” are the certified classics of this subgenre and there's a handful of other flicks that deserve mention. What about “The Wraith?” I remember seeing part of the movie while passing through a friend's house, always remembering the cool title and the cooler car. After a recent Purple Stuff Podcast episode raved about the movie, I knew I had to watch it during the Halloween Horror-fest Blog-a-thon.

A strange spirit has come to visit Brook, Arizona. It drives a very fast, very sleek black car and wears a concealing helmet. Packard Welsh is the leader of a gang, forcing people into drag races and stealing their cars when they loose. He's been stalking Keri, a waitress at the local burger stand. He might have also been responsible for murdering Jamie, Keri's ex-boyfriend. The black car begins to pursue Packard and his gang, killing them one by one. The cops chase the killer but have no leads. Around the same time, a mysterious boy named Jacob appears and begins to romance Keri. He is here for revenge. He is the Wraith.

I'm not a car guy by any means but even I know a sweet ride when I see one. And the central car in “The Wraith” is pretty friggin' bad-ass. Officially, the car model is a Dodge M4S Turbo Interceptor but they just call it the Interceptor for most of the movie. It's a shiny black bullet of a car and drives really fucking fast. It's the coolest car in the movie but seemingly everyone in “The Wraith” drives a supped-up monster of some sort. Naturally, all the cool cars are simply precursors to some cool car crashes. This is the titular wraith's main mode of execution. He leads the gang members on chases before magically teleporting the car into the center of the road, leading to spectacular crashes. Among these impressive sights are an eight-teen wheeler loosing several of the smaller vehicles it's hauling and a triple roll down a hill. The best crash in the movie occurs when the Interceptor drives into a wooden building. The barn goes up in a huge explosion, seemingly because the car was just going that fast.

Tying these awesome car sequences together is a heaping helping of campy ridiculousness. “The Wraith” has got to be the most 1986-esque movie I've seen recently. The soundtrack is full of the big hits of the day, including instantly recognizable songs from Billy Idol, Ozzy Osborne, Bonnie Tyler and Robert Palmer. The regular score is driven by some high-powered synth. The fashion is heavy on bright colors, denim, and torn jeans. Then there's the characters. Packard's gang is full of goofy-ass characters. There's a mo-hawked punk who is usually tweaking on something. He's frequently accompanied by a nincompoop with a speech impediment. Nobody other than Clint Howard, featuring the goofiest haircut in the movie, plays the flunky responsible for waving the flags during the races. There's female carhops in revealing outfits and a fat, ill-tempered sheriff. Randy Quaid is perfectly cast as said sheriff.

Practically every corner of “The Wraith” is full of charming goofiness like this. Except for one. The main characters are a total blank. Charlie Sheen stars in the film. Sheen is an occasionally compelling leading man. Here, he plays Jacob as an emotional blank, grunting monosyllabic noises through most of his dialogue. It's hard to believe anyone could have a romance with someone this unresponsive. Sherilyn Fenn, as Keri, plays her part admirably, doing what she can to make a fairly thin character interesting. However, she cannot generate any chemistry from Sheen. Maybe Charlie took the idea of playing a dead guy a little too literally. Jacob is only interesting when dressed-up as the Wraith and I'm pretty sure it wasn't Sheen under that helmet.

Like so much eighties trash, “The Wraith” got shown on cable a lot, leading to a small following. On one level, I understand that. “The Wraith” is a bit too goofy not to be lovable in some ways. And, yes, that car and the associated crashes are cool enough to make the whole movie worth watching. However, “The Wraith” ultimately lacks the necessary amounts of heart to make it a genuine cult classic. This one would actually be a good candidate for a remake, as the original needs some obvious improvements and the premise is general enough that you could do all sorts of stuff with it. But you'd have to keep the Interceptor. That part is non-negotiable. [6/10]

Children of the Damned (1964)

“Village of the Damned” is a sci-fi/horror classic, providing the world with one of the most famous examples of evil children in cinema. Its image of silver-haired children with glowing, hypnotic eyes made it a surprise hit in 1960. A sequel of sorts would follow in 1964. “Children of the Damned” would retain the premise of other-wordly children with telepathic powers but handled the concept in a wildly different manner. While not as successful as the original and widely overlooked over the years, even by classic horror fans, the film is generally well-liked by those who have seen it.

A nation-wide experiment, testing the intelligence of young children, has uncovered an extraordinarily intelligent young boy named Paul. Further test prove that Paul is not just really smart but also psychic, capable of hypnotizing the adults around him. Soon, other countries discovered similarly gifted children. They are brought from their embassies to London. The children escape government custody. The kids hide inside an abandoned church, using their powers to defend themselves from anyone who attempts to enter, and create experimental machines. Government around the world soon begin to wonder if the inhuman children are a threat to humanity. A psychologist and geneticist attempt to protect these children of the damned.

The original “Village of the Damned” was obviously of the Cold War era. References are made in the film to the Soviet Union. Threats from other civilizations and a generally political unease defined the film's story. The mostly unrelated sequel follows this path, becoming a full-blown geopolitical thriller. The children come from all over the world, including the Soviet Union and China. One of the reasons the children frightened the various governments is because they are a hive mind. What one knows, all the other knows. There are several scenes of government officials deliberating over what to do with the children, how big of a threat they might be. This provides a more topical feeling, setting “Children of the Damned” apart from its prequel and encapsulating the fears and paranoia of the day.

“Children of the Damned” isn't even truly a sequel, as the sinister kids have entirely different origins and temperaments. Instead of being outright malevolent, the kids are mostly neutral. They only use their powers to achieve their goals or defend themselves. They mostly want to be left to their own devices. And yet, there's still something off-putting about them. They rarely speak. Their wide-eyed stares are hard to read. Whenever they display their powers, the results are unnerving. Even the lair they choose, a dilapidated gothic cathedral, is creepy. As the film goes on, we learn that their powers are even more extreme then originally thought. It certainly makes the plot's central question – whether or not the children mean us harm – a trickier proposition. That the movie never judges in either direction, letting the audience decide, adds to its power.

The film was directed by Anton Leader, the sole feature film credit in a career primarily devoted to television. Despite his background, Leader makes this a handsome looking film. The black-and-white photography is delivered in an almost sterile way, contributing to the otherworldly atmosphere surrounding the titular children. There's also a classic horror vibe, emphasized by the long shadows of the spooky churn. The cast is solid too, composed primarily of British character actors. Ian Hendry brings a subtle humor to his role as Lewellin, the psychologist who discovers the children. He has a good rapport with Alan Badel, who plays the geneticist. I also rather like Barbara Ferris as Susan, the young woman drafted unwillingly to become the children's emissary and caretaker.

Changing the children from outwardly evil to more inscrutable characters probably annoyed fans of the original, who paid to see this back in 1964. It obviously brought the franchise to an end, as no more sequels were produced. “Children of the Damned” was sold as a straight-up shocker but there's less evil kid action in this one than the advertisements implied. Still, taken on its own, it's an interesting film, equal parts intelligent sci-fi, Cold War thriller, and spooky gothic horror film. Most home video releases have packaged the two movies together, so you'll probably watch it anyway. [7/10]

Hammer House of Horror: Children of the Full Moon

A few years ago, I reviewed an episode of “Hammer House of Horror,” an attempt by the then mostly defunct studio to keep their brand name alive. “The House That Bled to Death” is obviously the most famous episode of the series but fans of the show seem to consider “Children of the Full Moon” the best episode. (It was also among the handful of episodes released on VHS stateside in the eighties, with host segments from Elvira.) The episode concerns Tom and Sarah, a young married couple traveling through the British countryside. After experiencing car troubles, they take shelter in a country manor. The house is home to an old woman and several strange children. At night, wolves are heard howling and Sarah is attacked by an unseen beast. Several weeks later, she discovers she's pregnant and her behavior becomes odd. Tom begins to wonder if her pregnancy and their visit at the odd house aren't connected.

“Children of the Full Moon” begins like a standard horror story, one that wouldn't be out of place in a classic Hammer movie. Car problems causing people to hide in a weird house is one of those classic premises, you know. That portion of “Children of the Full Moon” is rather effective. The house is a good location, full of wandering hallways. The kids are genuinely eerie, starring oddly or disappearing suddenly. The caretaker, an older woman, appears friendly but is clearly hiding something. When she tells the couple not to leave their room at night, “Children of the Full Moon” reaches a turning point. The attack scene that follows keeps the violence entirely off-screen but is effectively intense, focusing on Susan's screaming face and off-screen animal noises.

The sudden story turn that follows definitely catches you off-guard. Tom wakes up, is told it was all a dream, and the two return home. “Children of the Full Moon” then switches gears, from being a classical monster movie concept to a story about pregnancy anxiety. This second half is not as compelling, though the sight of Susan eating whole chunks of raw meat is effectively gross. “Children of the Full Moon” does redeem itself with an ending that brings things full circle, though a bit too downbeat. Honestly, I feel like this one would've been improved if the title and pre-credits scene – a little girl attacking and eating a lamb – had been different. “Children of the Full Moon” would've had a better central mystery if we didn't immediately know it was about werewolves, setting up the eventual conclusion. [7/10]

The S from Hell (2010)

Rodney Ascher has carved out an interesting career for himself, as one of the few people who make documentaries that double as horror movies. “Room 237” would really grab people's attention while “The Nightmare” was genuinely frightening. Ascher's first stab at this odd genre mash-up was “The S from Hell.” It's a short documentary about the phenomenon of “Scary Logos:” Television and film production company logos that scared people as kids. Specifically, it focuses on the 1965 Screen Gems logo, nicknamed the S from Hell. Apparently, the swirling S and weird synthesizer music upset many children. Ascher builds his documentary around interviews with some of the S's victims.

Ascher's “Room 237” was fascinating to me. Not because I thought any of the conspiracy theories about “The Shining” had much credence – they don't – but because the documentary showed how varied people's reactions to the same work of art can be. “The S from Hell” doesn't go that deep but does show how totally innocuous things can have an unpredictable effect on people. Honestly, even as someone who was a very timid kid, I'm a little baffled how something as simple as a production logo could scare someone. I don't see anything especially sinister about the swirling lines and short synth loop. Yet the people go on about how the music sounds demonic, distorted or backwards. How the dot in the center of the S looked like a starring eye. It is definitely interesting to hear about how something so simple reverberated in people's minds and memories.

“The S from Hell” also shows that Ascher's directorial style was fairly well defined, right from the beginning. The short plays audio from folks traumatized by the logo over stock footage from old movies, TV shows, and industrial videos. It even includes a scene from “Halloween III,” which is pretty funny. Sometimes, Ascher visualizes the various memories. Like one woman's account of hiding behind the couch when the logo would appear on the TV. Or how a guy's older sister would torment him by holding him down and whispering “Screen Gems!” The flashiest moment is a recreation of a woman's nightmare, about being chased by a giant version of the logo. That's a pretty wild image. The short doesn't go any further into the bizarre internet subculture of production logo fanatics – yes, that's a thing that exist – but it does make for an interesting, if occasionally confusing, eight minutes. [7/10]

Bangers n' Mash 93: Hammer Horror

Told you this would go up on the 31st, which it still is in certain parts of the globe.

The latest episode of the Bangers n' Mash Show has Zack and JD returning to a former topic. We're discussing the films of Britain's most iconic horror studio: Hammer! While we've discussed some of the studio's biggest franchises before (or will some day), this episode is devoted to some of Hammer's one-offs and oddball flicks.



If I'm being totally honest, this episode is a compromised affair. Once again, my co-host let me down and only bothered to watch a third of the films we had agreed to discuss. In order to make up for this, I solo recorded some thoughts on the other movies we intended to talk about. However, this month has been exhausting and extremely hectic. Time was running out and I made the decision to cut out my thoughts on "Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde" and "Demons of the Mind." I'm sure the twenty people who regularly listen to the show will be really broken up about this. I'm really sorry this episode sucks. I worked hard to get out what I could in the time I had.

FURTHER UPDATES: So remember how I said there would be another Memories article this month? This too is a casualty of how insane my life has been. If you want to know the truth, my grandmother had a heart attack two weeks ago. She's slowly been dying and these family details have been taking over my life. In other words, July has been a bit of a mess.

However, I sincerely hope August will be better. I don't know when but I promise that the new Memories essay, as well as another stand-alone review, will be up at some point this week. A new actor's retrospective will begin on the 8th. That is set in stone, I promise you. To anybody reading this: I'm sorry I let you down and promise I'll do better this month. See you soon.

Halloween 2014: October 26

Mighty Joe Young (1998)

I’m not sure what inspired Disney to remake “Mighty Joe Young” in the late nineties. The original was known, and well-liked in certain circles, but not quite a universally beloved classic. The same year, Godzilla got a long-simmering remake of sorts. Maybe remakes of classic ‘50s monster flicks were expected to become the next big trend in Hollywood. As we all know now, TriStar’s “Godzilla” was a huge disappointment. 1998’s “Mighty Joe Young” was a box office dud too. Honestly, the film’s not horror at all, which might make you wonder why I’m reviewing it on the week of Halloween, especially since I’ve pointedly skip the various King Kong remakes. The honest truth? I got it out of a K-Mart five dollar dump bin. There, that’s my terrible secret.

The remake updates the original’s story to the modern day. In the wilds of Africa, Jill Young is living with her mother, a zoologist studying gorillas. Jill has already befriended Joe, an abnormally large baby gorilla. When both of their mothers are killed by poachers, Jill and Joe’s bound grows stronger. Twenty years later, Joe has grown up to be the size of an elephant. The original’s nightclub owner is switched out for a wildlife refugee director, who entices Jill to bring the big ape to America, in hopes of keeping him safe. Joe makes the news, naturally, drawing the attention of a vengeful poacher.

Much as monster fans love it, stop-motion animation effects weren’t going to fly in 1998. The remake of “Mighty Joe Young” brings the gorilla to life mostly through animatronic suits. Joe is immediately recognizable as the work of Rick Baker and his team, comparable to his similar work in “Gorillas in the Mist” and other films. The creature work is excellent. Joe is expressive and always seems real. Occasionally, Baker’s great work is traded out for some CGI which has, as you’d expect, hasn’t aged well. More importantly, Joe remains a full-blown character. He gets sad, scared, angry, curious, and remorseful. A favorite moment of mine has the gorilla waving at a little boy he passes while in transport. The ape has a lot of personality. Instead of rampaging through a night club, the movie upgrades the finale to Hollywood. Joe sits on a blaring car, a moment prominently featured in the trailers, and climbs Grauman’s Chinese Theater. You can tell “Tremors” director Ron Underwood and his team were fans of the original as Joe is treated with a proper amount of awe, affection and respect. (Also, Ray Harryhausen and Terry Moore have a super cute cameo.)

The remake leads with a pair of solid actors. Charlize Theron had yet to define herself as a leading lady yet, her Best Actress Oscar several years off. This film was actually her first top-billed performance. Theron is good, a few flat line readings aside. Jill in this version is much more proactive and tough. The romance in the original was fairly routine which the remake attempts to correct. Bill Paxton is an improvement over Ben Johnson’s Gregg. While Johnson was mostly an undefined cowboy type, Paxton plays the character as an impassioned defender of wildlife. He has a charming, rogue-ish quality to him that plays to Paxton’s strength as a performer. Theron and Paxton have decent chemistry together. Yet the romantic subplot is still mostly put into the film for its own sake.

Most of the criticism of 1998’s “Mighty Joe Young” have centered around the story’s Disneyfication. The remake doesn’t soften the story too much, as it was already pretty soft. However, it does add a big villain to the piece. Strasser, an evil poacher, gets his thumb bitten off by baby Joe before the opening credits. In the years after that, he’s become a seller of endangered animal parts. His process is fairly cartoonish. He convinces people with rare animals that he runs a preserve, before actually killing the animal and selling it. I don’t think that would be a sustainable business model. The guy is reintroduced talking about murdering a panda bear. How much more blatantly evil could you get? This plot development really seems forced in, especially as the film goes on. I don’t know if a big stand-off between Joe and the bad guy was necessary. The original “Joe” featured a fairly mawkish ending. This being Disney, the studio couldn’t help but play that up even more. Instead of saving babies from a burning orphanage, Joe rescues a kid from a collapsing Ferris wheel. The sequence is dramatically directed but the image of Joe, on the ground, near death, with Jill weeping above him, is rather overwrought. Considering how much more collateral damage Joe reaps in this version, I can’t foresee the ape surviving and returning to Africa, much less a new nature perverse being opened with money from charitable donations. Jill would be up to her eyeballs in lawsuits.

“Mighty Joe Young” is hyper inoffensive and, as a result, relatively forgettable. It’s a decent remake, as it expands and updates the story logically. However, it does so without bringing anything new to the table. The cast is likable, the effects are great, James Horner’s score is above average, but I’d be surprised if I remember anything about this remake in a year’s time. Stick with the original. [6/10]

Sick Girl (2007)

“Sick Girl” doesn’t make any friends with its opening scene. The movie begins with Izzy, its main character, covered in dirt and standing on the side of the road. After a school bus picks her up, a pair of Catholic school girls mock her and a possibly mentally disabled girl gawks at her. Izzy then punches out a nun and urinates on her. Next, she hitches a ride with a pair of obnoxious guys, abrasive punk music blaring from their radio. Izzy quickly slices the one’s throat, tracks down the school bus, and murders most everyone inside. “Sick Girl” is not a nice movie. It’s a splatterpunk novel put to film, most assuredly not for everyone, and will actively put off the majority of viewers.

Yet after that, “Sick Girl” falls into a weird balance. The post-opening scene has Izzy washing her bloody clothes, silent flashbacks to the earlier carnage playing in her head. She’s lives with her little brother Kevin, family friend Barney frequently stopping by. Their parents are gone. Izzy’s older brother Rusty, a marine, is overseas. Izzy sexually, romantically pines for Rusty, a feeling he didn’t reciprocate. In her free time, when not helping her family, she brutally murders and tortures anyone who irritates her. The scenes focused on Izzy’s relationship with her little brother and Barney are sincere. A moment where she tucks him into bed, teasing and tickling him, is genuinely sweet. The movie’s set around the holidays and a Christmas morning gift exchange is funny and soft as well. The reason “Sick Girl” works – maybe the only reason it works – is because the familial bond between the characters reads as real and well earned.

This counts for a lot since, when “Sick Girl” isn’t focused on a small family trying to survive in a rough world, it’s focused on hardcore torture and death. Izzy tracks down a trio of bullies harassing Kevin. All the kids are around eight years old. She forces the ringleader of the bullies to drawn the other kids in a river and chides him when he stabs one in the back. The surviving kid is taken back to the family stable, where Izzy strings him up, has a live rat chew on his face, and breaks his arms and legs. The most graphic scene in the movie comes when Izzy castrates the lone survivor of the opening murder. She strings the severed penis on a chain around her waist and rapes one of the virginal schoolgirls with it. It’s, uh, a rough moment. The gore effects are crude enough that it registers as shocks-for-shocks sake, instead of having any deeper purpose. Yet many of these gruesome moments are characterized by a blackly comedic tone. An obnoxiously saccharine pop song plays during the aforementioned castration/rape scene. When abducting the young bullies, Izzy makes an off-hand quip about pitch-forking someone. There’s a glib sarcasm to much of the slaughter, which certainly helps soften the blow.

Holding the movie together, in an odd way, is Leslie Andrews’ lead performance as Izzy. Andrews is about an unconventional a leading lady as you could ask for. With a boy’s haircut, a short stature, wide owl eyes, buckteeth, numerous tattoos, and a square body, she’s no one’s idea of a movie star. She’s an uneven actress, giving some of Izzy’s lengthy monologues a flat, self-serious reading. Andrews, however, has something even the best actors don’t always achieve: An unforgettable screen presence and a compelling nature that viewers can’t look away from. There’s an overwhelming intensity behind her huge, blue eyes. She gives Izzy an unpredictable edge. The girl really does act as if her whole world is crumbling, that you have no idea what she’ll do next. This is best displayed during an awkwardly funny sequence where Izzy is picked up by a driver. The guy says all the wrong things and comes very close to getting his throat slashed. That doesn’t happen though because the guy doesn’t offend Izzy’s interior morals. The moment is both suspenseful and weirdly funny. “Sick Girl” would probably not be worth watching without Andrews. She hasn’t worked a lot since this but she deserves a lengthy, character actress’ career.

“Sick Girl” is hard to like for other reasons beyond its self-aggravatingly gruesome content. The visual aesthetic is ugly. The colors are washed out. The sound design is grating, with an abrasive, throbbing electronic score. The plot is loose, without a lot of major events. The whole thing is only a little over an hour too, making it seem like there wasn’t much of a script to begin with. On his subsequent film, “House of the Wolf Man,” Eben McGarr proved that he has a strong command of visuals and style. (If not the ability to write a wholly compelling script.) So “Sick Girl’s” hideous look has to be intentional. The movie puts you in the ugly, bi-polar world of a mentally unstable serial killer. Izzy is, as the title indicates, sick. The movie around her follows suit.

Despite a mountain of reservations, I like “Sick Girl.” Eben McGarr is the truest of independent filmmakers, scrapping his tiny movies together with tiny amounts of money. The movie is undisciplined and obviously unpolished. Beneath the grime, there’s a strange heart and soul and a true understanding of the main character. It’s probably not a good date movie but patient, tolerant indie horror fans might want to give it a look. [7/10]

Hammer House of Horror: The House That Bled to Death

Every year around October, strictly for fun, I cut together a mix of commercials, trailers, short films, and horror movie and TV episode clips. Just for my friends and I. I call it my Halloween Megamix. Anyway, while looking for scary moments from horror television history to include, I learned about “The House That Bled to Death.” It’s an episode of the eighties British anthology series, “Hammer House of Horror.” The series was an attempt by the defunct Hammer Studio to extend their iconic brand into the then-modern age. Despite its brief run, the show maintains a following and even got a state-side DVD release.

The hour is a fairly typical haunted house story and almost definitely inspired by “The Amityville Horror.” A husband, wife, and their young daughter move into a new home, unaware of that the last man to live there murdered and dismembered his wife. Immediately, strange things begin to befall the family. A pair of rusty kukris are found in the home. The family cat dies mysteriously and gruesomely. The picture of her father that the daughter keeps on her bedside catches fire. Blood leaks from the plumbing. The stress takes its toll on the wife. Eventually, things are revealed to not be what they seem.

The reason “The House That Bled to Death” has been singled out from the other “Hammer House of Horror” episodes is one specific scene. In order to help the traumatized daughter settle into her new home, her parents throw a birthday party with all the other kids in the neighborhood. While the little kids are gathered around the table for cake, a pipe comes loose from the wall. After sputtering for a minute, blood pours from the pipe, dousing the mom and kids. It’s a shocking moment, gruesomely funny without sacrificing its horrifying qualities.

Does the rest of the episode lived up to that fantastic moment. Not really. There’s a lot of the typical haunted house shenanigans. The family doesn’t move out despite the horrifying things happening around them. The slow build is especially slow. The noisy neighbors play far too extended a role. The performances are fairly cheesy. Aside from the bleeding walls, “The Amityville Horror” was an influence in another way. Both are obvious metaphors for a new home nickel-and-diming a struggling family to death.

However, the twist ending seems to acknowledge the facts behind the Amityville case. Turns out, the entire thing was hoaxed by the family in order to make themselves rich from book and movie deals. It’s an utterly preposterous and unlikely ending but I still liked it. I’m not sure I have much interest to seeking out the rest of “Hammer House of Horror” but “The House That Bled to Death” is a decently entertaining episode, if one hobbled by the conventions of early eighties television. [7/10]

Bangers n' Mash 46: Dracula Through the Ages

July went by quickly, didn't? I apologize for the lack of updates here of late. The month has been extremely hectic. I'm hoping to turn that around this month but I probably shouldn't make promises.

Anyway, here's the latest episode of the Bangers n' Mash Show. There was some talk about vampires on the Facebook recently which is coincidental but appropriate. In this episode, JD and I discuss the greatest of all vampires: Count Dracula, himself. We mostly focus on the Hammer films but squeeze in a few other notable Dracula flicks. It's a good episode.



Like I said, more stuff coming soon. Hopefully.

Halloween 2011: October 26

The Kiss of the Vampire (1963)
I’ll admit, the non-franchise Hammer vampire movies always felt a little out-of-place. “Kiss of the Vampire” uses the original ending of “Brides of Dracula” and, in general, feels like it’s made up of unused ideas cooked up for “Dracula” films. This has the bizarre effect of making the movie play with the conventions and expectations of the subgenre some. Instead of just one vampire being the primary threat, such as a Dracula or Baron Meinstar, we have to contend with a whole family of vampires. A family that, as the story goes on, seems more and more like a cult. (Right down to the matching white robes.) Our vampire hunter character is even more off-putting and strange then Van Helsing, seeming very off-balanced and dangerous during large portions of the film. He even saves the day by using Satanic magic. (Correcting the point I made in my “Brides of Dracula” review, the vampire hunter uses the exact same cure to fix a vampire bite.) The early presence of an automobile should clue you in that “Kiss of the Vampire” is a little off-beat.

The movie has an excellent opening sequence. A mostly silent funeral procession is broken only when the gravedigger drives the shovel through the coffin lid and into the corpse’s heart, the vampire’s scream shattering the overwhelming silence. The movie never quite lives up to that moment but does a good job of building atmosphere. The audience knows the family is composed of vampires early, during another atmospheric scene where a vampire girl discovers the shovel-impalement from the opening, but the two main characters do not. It’s the classic bomb-under-the-table scenario and works pretty well. The vampire family is nicely neurotic too, with a lot of tension and fear within the family. I also like the quirky inn owners that end up playing an important role in the latter half of the film. The masquerade scene is also a highlight.

Sadly, the movie kind of looses a lot of steam after the girlfriend is kidnapped. Seems like the story starts to go in circles as the husband attempts to break into the castle and rescue his girl only to be kicked back out again. The final scene of magically summoned bats being used to destroy all the vampires sure is a bizarre kicker of an ending. “Kiss of the Vampire” is mostly an off-beat, overlooked little part of the Hammer cannon. It’s a nice counterbalance to all their other vampire films. (7/10)


The Fly (1958)
You know, I loved this movie when I first saw it as a ten-year-old. Absolutely adored it, was obsessed with it for a long time. Along with the Universal monsters, this if the film probably responsible for my horror fandom. Which is really weird, because this film is a melodramatic, campy, stagey film with a standard 1950s moral about man meddling in the affairs of God. The French Canadian setting makes it an even unlikelier favorite of a pre-teen kid obsessed with monsters, dinosaurs, anime babes, and robots.

Oh, but the movie is so successful at what it does. It starts out as a chamber mystery. We begin with a fantastic set-up. A man was crushed in an industrial press by a seemingly sane, loving, calm wife, whose behavior becomes increasingly erratic, developing an obsession with flies. We are well into the movie before we get the flashback that explains exactly the cause of this. What a tasty, catchy set-up. How can you resist that? Vincent Price wasn’t known as a horror star yet and he plays the straight man, along with Inspector Charas, reacting to the increasingly strange events around them, unbelieving and unsure of how to react.

Once we get to the meat of the story, the flashback, things get a little crazier and more overheated. Andre and Helen are such a loving couple who are completely devoted to one another. She is the perfect wife, taking care of the house and kid while Andre toils down in his laboratory, changing the world one invention at the time. They live in this perfect little microcosm, straight out of a 1950s sitcom. Of course, we all know this is going to have a gory ending, but the movie doesn’t build for suspense. Instead this time is used to build up characters and set-up. The flashing teleporter lights come off as very campy and retro now but have a hypnotic angle to it. The movie continues to work as an extremely effective mystery story even in this section. Andre attempts to work out each one of the kinks in his teleporter, discovering new ones, solving old problems, always working forward. The movie gets undeniably campy in scenes… “A stream of cat atoms” being the most obvious moment but the scenes were the couple sit on their front lawn and discuss the relation of science to God also smacks of 1950s moralizing. But you’re still hooked. As unrealistic and arch as it seems, Andre and Helen can’t help but be enduring characters.

Once things go wrong, the movie continues to work like a great page-turner. The Fly is only revealed one little piece at a time. Weren’t not sure what’s going on at first and the movie takes it’s time laying out clues and reveals. The shot of his claw emerging from the white lab coat, even with the melodramatic score playing underneath, remains startling. More effective then the make-up or monster antics is David Hedison’s performance under the make-up. I love the way he illustrates how he’s loosing control over his mind and body. The shot of him grabbing the trembling fly-claw is great. And, of course, the unmasking of the Fly is a classic sequence. The multi-lens shot of Patricia Owens’ screaming face is rightfully iconic. The Fly head design is pretty subtle truthfully, especially compared to the over-the-top creature design in “The Return of the Fly.”

The movie’s conclusion is ultimately an emotional one. Despite their relationship coming off as corny and unrealistic, this is still a successful love story. The sequence of Andre, his human mind succumbing completely to the fly’s brain, scratching out the message of “love you” slowly on the board, the last message he can ever send as he looses his sanity, really does pull at your heart strings. The happy ending is admittedly tacked on but Vincent Price assuring little Philippe that his father was an adventurer and a courageous man feels right within the context of the film’s emotional heart. (It also helps dispel some of the film’s unseemly, reactionary, “He tampered in God’s domain!” tone.)

Honestly, the equally iconic “Help me!” scene comes off as a bit of an afterthought. It wraps up the story’s loose ends and is a fantastic, surreal, image to take the film out on. (The half-human/half-fly make-up ends up predicting the body horror of Cronenberg’s remake.) Maybe it’s the film’s oversized emotions and melodrama, it’s main detractions, that are exactly the thing that made it a beloved film for ten-year-old me. That, along with an understated, hearty Vincent Price performance and some very famous, effective horror scenes. “The Fly,” flaws and all, is a classic. (8/10)

Halloween 2011: October 25

The Brides of Dracula (1960)
Another Hammer film I’ve always remembered loving, though I’ll admit it’s been a while since I’ve seen it. This time, rewatching, it certainly seemed to take a very long time to get going. The scenes of Marianne exploring the Meinstar castle are quite good and slowly form a foreboding atmosphere. I also love the idea of Baroness Meinstar, a great performance by Martita Hart by the way, knowing her son is a vampire and keeping him locked up. However, if you know the Baron is a vampire, and it’s fairly obvious even to first time viewers, the scenes don’t exactly have a lot of suspense to them. You’re pretty much just waiting for the Baron to get free and start with the vampiring. The fact that the film is almost over before Marianne is aware that the Baron’s a vampire doesn’t make her the most compelling Hammer heroine either. There are a few nice scenes of Marianne talking with her students, the best moments occurs over burnt toast, but generally I find the female parts here a bit thin. (They’re not as sexy either. Seems like the trademark Hammer light-eroticism didn’t become a part of the films until the next year’s “Curse of the Werewolf.”)

But once Van Helsing shows up, it’s a whole different movie. Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing remains my favorite take on the character. Cushing and the filmmakers continue to show Van Helsing as an action-ready combat pragmatist. Swinging from ropes, dangling from wind mills, tossing crucifixes across tables, and always confronting the evil head-on, Cushing’s doctor is the prototype for the current concept of the kick-ass vampire hunter. When the doctor starts talking about how all vampires are evil affronts to God’s goodness and must be eliminated thoroughly, it could sound bad coming out of anybody else’s mouth. But Cushing is as gentle as he is strong. You believe what he’s doing is right. The Hammer variety of vampires are a far cry from the morally neutral creatures of today anyway. Without Christopher Lee around, this movie becomes a full blown showcase for Cushing’s unique style of badassery. My favorite display of this trait is also one of the movie’s most famous, and unique, moments. After being bitten by the Baron, Van Helsing cauterizes the wound with a iron and dashes holy water on it. It’s a method for immediate vampire cure that I’ve never seen before or since. Van Helsing himself seems surprised that it works.

The movie is full of other interesting, indelible moments. The insane, cackling servant urging a fledgling vampire out of her grave is a great moment. Similarly, the discovery of the insane servant and the remorseful, transformed Baroness is another good, earlier moment. Van Helsing later puts the Baroness out of her misery, in a rare example of a sympathetic Hammer vampire. The scene of Gina rising from her coffin and attempting to “kiss” Marianne is another moment, dripping with casual lesbian undertones. And, of course, the entire final confrontation in the mill is a fantastic action set piece. After creatively saving himself from a vampire’s bite, Van Helsing cooks up an equally creative way to deal with Baron Meinstar. This movie continues to improve on and add to the Hammer style of foggy, English atmosphere. In that regard, it’s a better film then “Horror of Dracula.”

“The Brides of Dracula” has only one major distraction. David Peel sure ain’t any Christopher Lee. He’s too young and pretty to be intimidating and too flat to be charismatic. He’s a pretty weak substitute for Lee’s Drac. The way the brides are also assumed to perish in a fire off-screen at the end is also a bit anti-climatic. Overall though, “Brides of Dracula” is another Hammer classic and one of the studio’s best productions. (9/10)


The Phantom of the Opera (1962)
One of my least favorite adaptations of the “Phantom” story. (Though, admittedly, the only version I really like is the Lon Chaney one and nothing tops the Dario Argento take for badness.) First off, the Phantom isn’t really a threat in this film at all. He’s not the villain of the piece. He doesn’t kill a single person. He doesn’t do anything except tutor Christine in singing and threaten Michael Gough. For whatever bizarre reason, this film takes the same origin for the Phantom that the 1945 Claude Rains-starring adaptation did. The Opera Ghost wasn’t born deformed, doesn’t have a history of assassination, and shows genius in no other category but music. The Phantom isn’t even Erik anymore, being recasted as Professor Petrie, once again someone who has his music stolen and has his face horribly burnt in an accident. The villain of the piece is obviously Michael Gough as the sleazy, asshole-y opera house owner and all of the violence, kidnapping, and traditional Phantom antics are delegated to a mute, dwarf assistant, another awkward addition to the tale. A sympathetic version of the Phantom certainly wasn’t unprecedented even in 1962, but a non-murderous one is unacceptable. Herbert Lom, a veteran genre performer even in the early 1960s, plays the Phantom as a scatterbrained, brain-damaged old man. It’s not a bad performance I suppose, but the character comes off as utterly neutered. The scene of a single tear running down his mask is hopelessly melodramatic.

I’ve never liked this one but decided to give it a fair shot. I only ended up noticing other problems. While Terence Fisher did a fantastic job of making the sets on the other Hammer films look like anything but, here his camera feels very boxed in. “The Phantom of the Opera” is the first Hammer film where it was obviously the movie was shot completely on sets. Instead of the story building to any sort of climax, we instead get a lot of singing. A lot of singing. Obviously it comes with the territory but the entire last ten minutes of the movie being devoted to an opera performance doesn’t match up to other last act Hammer theatrics. (The Phantom doesn’t even get his revenge on Gough, leaving two character arcs uncompleted.) The love story between Christine and Raoul-stand-in Harry is okay I suppose, and the couple get a few sweet moments, but it just feels like further stalling of the horror elements. I understand that it was a practical, budgetary decision, but relocating the story from Paris to London seems to drain a lot of its mythic power. London’s opera house certainly doesn’t have the history that Paris’ does.

Even with all of these issues, nobody could program a set-piece like Terence Fisher could. There are several memorable moments in an otherwise unmemorable film. The hanged body tearing through the curtain hand first and swinging towards both the figurative and literal audience is a fantastic scene. The Dwarf gets a great introduction, his face suddenly appearing in an opened window. Bach’s “Tocatta and Fugue,” so heavily associated with the character, is incorporated extraordinarily during the scene where Christine is kidnapped. The decision to have the Phantom himself crushed beneath the obligatory falling chandelier is a clever way to kill two birds with one stone as it were. I also like the red dropping curtain being one of the final images of the film. That’s appropriate. And though he throws the mask off for no reason other then the movie has to have an unmaksing scene, the Phantom make-up is very good, nicely gruesome while still being an accurate depiction of an acid scarred face. Heck, I even like the opening credit scene, as the camera hovers just over the water, watching the Phantom play his organ.

Hammer’s “Phantom of the Opera” definitely isn’t up to snuff with the classic Universal version, despite these stand out moments. The whole is definitely not the sum of its parts here. And the adaptations of the classic story would just continue to get further removed from the original novel’s tone, if not it’s story. And usually worse too, climaxing with Andrew Lloyd Weber’s musical for lonely housewives and the embarrassing sexypants film version, featuring a sun-burnt Gerald Butler as the titular villain. (I’ll give Weber this much, and this is the only time I’ll compliment his monstrosity, but at least his Phantom actually kills people.) (5/10)

Halloween 2011: October 24

Fantastic Dinosaurs of the Movies (1990)
Unlike “Hollywood Dinosaurs,” this is a straight-up trailer compilation with no narration or anything. The tape starts with a short promotional video taking us inside Ray Harryhausen’s work shop and showing off early sketches for many of the monsters from “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad.” The video also includes more then one lingering shot of starlet Kathryn Grant’s cleavage. So there’s that. The tape throws a much larger net then “Hollywood Dinosaurs” did as well, including a lot of trailers from non-dinosaur related movies. “Earth vs. The Spider,” “The Giant Claw,” “The Giant Gila Monster,” “20 Million Miles to Earth,” “Jason and the Argonauts,” the incredibly cheesy "Jack the Giant Killer," and a few other unrelated giant monster movies are tossed in for the heck of it. It’s all pretty entertaining stuff though I’ll admit the lack of coherence makes it better suited to background watching.

I don’t have too much else to say about this one, other then it throws in more obscure titles then “Hollywood Dinosaurs.” “Journey to the Beginning of Time,” “The Loch Ness Horror,” and the “The Crater Lake Monster” are ones I’ll admit I haven’t seen yet. This is also the third time this weekend I’ve seen the trailer for the Irwin Allen version of “The Lost World.” I haven’t seen that one either and the slurpasaur packed wonders it promises doesn’t exactly make me want to rush out and see it. I wonder what ever became of Frosty the Poodle? (6/10)


Curse of the Werewolf (1961)
I find Hammer horror is usually resistant to sociological readings, but there’s definitely something here. In the long prologue, a beggar wanders into a cruel nobleman’s castle, where he is humiliated before being “bought” and imprisoned in the castle dungeon. Years later, the mute daughter (Played by the gorgeous Yvonne Romain, with a plunging neckline.) of a castle servant is harassed and assaulted by the same nobleman before being locked up with the forgotten beggar. The rape, murder, and escape that follows is the origin for our werewolf protagonist. Later on, when Leon is a grown man, as he walks into town looking for work, an affluent man riding by in a carriage splatters him with mud. Similarly, a rich, well-dressed fop keeps Leon and his love, Carissa, separated. In the end, the lovers are kept apart by the spinning wheels of bureaucracy. The same system refuses to confront Leon’s lycanthropy, resulting in the werewolf’s climatic rampage through the town. Is it possible the film is saying that the rich, upper levels of society tend to treat the poor as if they were, *gasp*, animals? Though the metaphor seems to be forgotten once the film decides to focus on the werewolf attacks, there’s definitely a deliberate subtext here that you don’t usually find in Hammer’s films.

Any subtext werewolf movies usually have deal with puberty or uncontrollable lust. There’s some of that too. That the impetus of the werewolf’s birth is a sexual assault certainly doesn’t go unnoticed. Leon happens to be visiting a brothel when he first transforms into a werewolf. Most obviously, the cure for his lycanthropy is love… Good, clean, Christian love, though his relationship with Carissa is chaste only do to lack of time. It should be apparent by now that “Curse of the Werewolf” is not your typical werewolf movie. It’s not only the unusual origin of the curse that marks the difference. The film holds off on showing the werewolf make-up until the end, focusing more on the aftermath of his attacks.

Terence Fisher’s direction is more stylish then usual as well. There’s a few sweeping pans and, my favorite shot of the film, cuts from a swooping cloak to a wide shot of the tower’s courtyard. I love the final shot of a couple crying, isolated in the courtyard. I always really dug the werewolf make-up here. Classic it is, the Jack Pierce Lon Chaney make-up never really looked like a wolf. While it’s subtle and mostly involves a single forehead appliance and some fur, the werewolf design actually looks like a wolf. The performances are quite good as well. Oliver Reed isn’t all bluster like his performances usually are. He cries a lot too. In all seriousness, it’s a good performance. Clifford Evans and Hira Talfrey are also very good as Leon’s surrogate parents.

Overall, “Curse of the Werewolf” is one of my favorite Hammer films and one of their best productions in general. It’s a shame they never revisited the werewolf concept. (9/10)

Halloween 2011: October 17

Silent Madness (1984)
Now my friends will know what the hell I’m talking about when I talk about faith in work pants. Bleeding Skull described “Silent Madness” as a cozy, unambitious, slasher snack. But is it, really? The plot of a mistakenly released psychotic killer returning to the sorority house where he murdered a bunch of girls decades ago is as about routine a slasher premise as you can get, but the movie does a few things a little differently.

First off, the main characters aren’t brainless teenagers preoccupied with boning. Instead, it’s a responsible, work-a-holic female doctor, bristling against the corrupt staff at the mental institution responsible for freeing pasty-faced, beady-eyed psycho Howard Johns. Belinda Montgomery gives a pretty solid performance too. She’s not just a screaming, panicking girl that succeeds mostly through luck. She’s a pretty feisty chick. Also, her newspaper editor boyfriend… preoccupied with boning. (The movie’s not that different.) The supporting cast is equally eccentric. Lisping, grouchy, antisocial Sheriff Leggitt swears, whines, barks orders, and never actually does anything to help anybody throughout the course of the film. I suppose that makes the character sound annoying, but he’s actually endearing in an anti-heroic sort of way. (His relatively small amount of screen time might help too.) Seemingly the only other person working at the newspaper, an old woman, is also kind of bitchy but similarly entertaining. The sorority sisters aren’t defined to a great deal, but they’re never annoying or actively unlikable. I imagine if the film was longer, we certainly would have found out more about them. Stack a mysterious sorority mother with a funny accent on top and you’ve got a kooky character sundae.

The corrupt hospital staff, occupied by asshole doctors and especially sleazy orderlies provide another interesting, different aspect to the film. The twist ending more then implies that it’s actually the deranged hospital attendants that are responsible for making Howard Johns a silent, murderous madman and, when ordered to silence our lead lady, they seem far too eager to get their murder on. Maybe this subplot and its characters was added just to increase the body count but, even then, it further distinguishes “Silent Madness” from the rest of the pack.

Of course, there’s lots of good old fashion murder and exploitation to be had too. The first thing Mr. Johns does upon being released is murdered a naked couple in a van and crush a rollerskating teenage girl's head in a vice. Once he makes it back to the sorority house, he makes creative use of ropes and dumbbells. When we get to the inevitable climax of the final girl (Or woman, in this case) alone in an isolated building together, the movie features an intense chase through the ventilation shafts and an unexpected twist ending that successfully changes much of the film’s plot. The movie was originally filmed in 3D and the blades, blood, and other implements comin’ right atcha ya! ups the enjoyment even more. My copy of “Silent Madness,” purchased from the VHSPS booth, even features an MST3k style stinger at the end. Perfect. Seek this one out. (7/10)


Seconds Apart (2011)
Why do I keep taking a chance on After Dark Films’ unoriginal, mean-spirited, boring little pieces of shit? The concept of psychic twins seems like a decent start for a genre film but, sigh, “Seconds Apart” doesn’t do anything but annoy and aggravate.

First off, why the fuck are all of these HorrorFest movies shot in the same goddamn style? If I have to see another shaky-cam, music-video style nightmare sequence, Jesus Christ, I don’t know what I’ll do. Beyond that, seems like most of these movies are shot in the same gloomy, blue and grey color. And the cast members are always the most generic set of vapid, pretty young things that never seem to have more then one or two emotions. When the 7 Up Yours guy is the most interesting actor in your movie, you’ve got problems. And even then, his character has the most generic fucking arc you can imagine. He’s a bitter detective with a dead wife, reoccurring nightmares, and lots of guilt. (The token alcoholism has been substituted with an inability to quit smoking.) Gee, I wonder if he’ll manage to resolve his emotional problems right around the same time he resolves the case?

I had hoped that, twins being a different kind of subject, that the characters themselves would probably be interesting, right? Nope. Thing 1 and Thing 2 are mean-spirited little pricks, indifferent little monsters, that are, as far as I can tell, trying to experiences heavy emotions like love or disgust. This is sort of funny since they don’t seem to have any problem with other, run-of-the-mill emotions. Using their telepathic abilities, they force disgusting, unlikable people to do disgusting, unlikable things like shoot themselves, fuck random strangers on video, or drive into oncoming trucks. Before long, some random girl decides she wants to bang one of the twins for seemingly no reason and, even though the girl has no discernible interests or personality, the twin decides he loves her. (And doesn’t screw when she gets all naked and slutty with him. Because he's got feelings.) Hmm, could this relationship conceivably cause a conflict between the brothers? Duh. And, hey, let's throw a little bit of incest on there too, why the hell not?

Another key ingredient to the After Dark formula of suck is an asinine, pointless twist ending. Naturally, “Seconds Apart” delivers in that capacity. Not that the twist the hack writers came up with make any fucking sense. That’s not important. All that’s important is that they totally blow your mind, man!

About the only thing positive I can say about “Seconds Apart” is that the scene of the priest pulling the worm out of his leg is kind of cool, even if its as crass and gross as everything else. Also, it's short. For the people who manage to get through all of these things every year, I salute you. You’re stronger men then me. (2/10)

Curse of Frankenstein (1957)
This is what I needed to wash the flavor of that trash out of mouth. This was my introduction to Hammer and, along with “Horror of Dracula,” defined the studio style. Right out of the gate, the movie goes out of its way to distinguish itself from the Universal Frankenstein films. Instead of focusing on the monster, it focuses on the doctor himself and would continue to throughout the whole series. The creation doesn’t even show up until well after the halfway point.

This might have been a disappointing, frustrating move if it wasn’t for one point: Peter Cushing is fantastic as Baron Frankenstein. Cushing could play both ends of the spectrum. His Van Helsing was practically a superhero, always going head to head with Lee’s Dracula and bravely battling evil in all its form. His Baron Frankenstein, on the other hand, was devious, deceptive, sadistic, and focused solely on his mission of creating life, morality be damned. Throughout this movie and its many sequels, he has no qualms about murdering or betraying anybody who gets in his way. The Baron isn’t exactly evil to begin with and the movie makes it clear that his obsession steams from his parent’s early death. But it doesn’t take him long to fall off the slippery slope. He commits murder pretty much without any pause or concern. It’s not the richest character but Cushing goes at it with gusto, creating one of the most memorable villain protagonists of all time.

The thing I noticed this time when watching is the role women play. They are heavily featured but aren’t super important to the story. Hazel Court gets a lot of screen time as Elizabeth and the movie seems to set her up as Frankenstein’s moral compass. But the doctor’s pretty much evil right from the beginning and Elizabeth doesn’t actually do much beyond get threatened by the monster at the end. The doctor even gets a mistress in the form of maid Justine, but her role is small too. If anything, it’s the almost homoerotic relationship between Frankenstein and his best bro and science buddy Paul Krempe that provides the tension. The “Frankenstein” story has always been laced with a gay subtext but its pretty evident here. Frankenstein and Krempe are devoted to each and determined to create life on their own… At least until Frankenstein’s commitment to science breaks them up. The scene of Paul and the doctor fighting over a jarred brain, which ends with Paul damaging the brain like a passive-aggressive girlfriend, plays not like one man fighting the immoral decisions of an old friend, but more like a lovers' spat.

If anything, the movie slows down some once Christopher Lee’s monster shows up. Lee gets a truly fantastic introduction and his make-up is fantastic but the creature certainly doesn’t have the pathos of Karloff’s take, if for no other reason then he doesn’t have as much to do. He’s also more generally psychotic then Karloff, as his violence is mostly unprovoked. The movie does feature a lot of the standard Hammer bright red blood but it comes mostly from the doctor’s dissections then the monster’s rampage. Even without the monster, “Curse of Frankenstein” would have been a classic, just based on the strength of Cushing’s performance. (8/10)

Halloween 2011: October 13

10 to Midnight (1983)
It didn’t take long for the conventions of the slasher movie to trickle down into other genres. Considering that gritty crime stories, action movies, and horror probably all share the same audience, it really shouldn’t be a surprise that movies like this or the similarly themed “Cobra” (which features an entire cult of brutal knife-nuts) cropped up pretty quickly. “10 to Midnight” is basically “Dirty Harry” multiplied by itself. The hero is even more uncompromisingly conservative. The villain is even more crazy and vicious. The movie is even sleazier.

Charles Bronson had kind of an odd career path. He was a work-a-day character actor for a long time, grabbing a couple of decent roles here and there, before “Death Wish” happened and completely solidified his career. From that point on, he played the exact same role in each movie, a stern-faced enforcer of old-fashion ethics who strikes back against an ineffective society by taking the law into his own hands, preferably by popping a punk or two. Bronson’s performance is actually a little more involved then usual. He’s playing the same character he always does, of course, but he actually seems to have an iota of emotional investment in the material, as opposed to his usual stone-faced determination.

Gene Davis gives a really bizarre performance as the killer. His dialogue is often spoken stiltedly. The guy acts like a whiny, petulant child half of the time. He puts on a fake Spanish accent, has a giant picture of himself in a karate gi on his wall, hits on women in the most uncomfortable way imaginable, and never gives Bronson or the audience doubts that he’s anything but a complete creep and a total psychopath. The movie is so blatant that his murderous rage stems from oppressed, twisted sexuality that Bronson even says as much almost immediately. (Most movies would be content with simply implying that the killer’s knife is his dick, instead of out-right saying as much.) This all leads to the movie’s main gimmick, which is that the villain does all his stalking and slashing completely in the buff. There is so much bare man-ass in this movie, and almost as much wobbling wang. His targets are exclusively young, female, busty, and usually naked. Fucking, showering, or undressing is often interrupted only by brutal stabbings. The movie’s tidal wave of misogyny peaks with the Richard Speck-inspired finale, where the killer massacres an apartment full of nurses.

Despite a decent Bronson performance, enough slashing to satisfy the gorehound, and an intense finale, “10 to Midnight” is just a bit too mean-spirited and ugly to be enjoyable. It’s free of eighties camp. (6/10)


To the Devil a Daughter (1976)
What an inauspicious way for Hammer Studios to go out. “To the Devil a Daughter” wound up being their final film production. The studio finally broke with its period settings to make a modern story of demonic influence, obviously an attempt to jump on the Devil stories trend that was popular in the mid-seventies. The results are unfortunately droll. The story essentially boils down to an occult writer (Richard Widmark) and a Satanist priest (Christopher Lee) battling for control of an innocent young girl (Nastassja Kinski), who is destined to be the Earthly avatar of the demon Astaroth. However, Widmark and Lee never even come face-to-face until the end of the movie. Lee spends the majority of the run time staring off-screen, while people in other rooms get murdered or burst into to flames or, in the film’s highest camp moment, a glowing image of Lee’s face appears above a window. Scratch that. The movie’s campiest moment is the Satanic ritual where the symbol of Astaroth, a golden statue doing a split on an inverted cross, is moved suggestively over Kinski’s prone body, while an orgy breaks out around her, including Christopher Lee’s naked ass. (Thanks for that one, movie.)

Widmark proves to be an overly literary, uninvolving protagonist. He spends large portions of the film talking on the phone or looking at a book. Lee actually does an okay job as another villain. It’s certainly a more involved performance then his last few go-arounds as Dracula, but his character doesn’t have much to do. Kinski would bloom into perhaps the most beautiful woman in the world in a few years (And does some gratuitous full frontal here. Not a complaint) but her performance is a bit on the sleepy side.

The film ends on an almost hilariously anti-climatic note. Lee has captured Kinski and is ready to transfer the demon’s spirit into her body, the altar surrounded by a magic circle of protective blood. Widmark walks up to him, the two argue over confusing mythology for a while, Widmark throws a small rock at Lee’s head, picks up the girl, and walks off. That’s it. And I thought Lee getting killed by a magic bush in “The Satanic Rites of Dracula” was an undignified death scene.

When “To the Devil a Daughter’ isn’t being boring, it’s being overly icky, like the extended sequence of the demonic baby (which looks like a bloody bear fetus) performing cunnilingus on an all too willing Kinski. The movie also wastes a great supporting cast, including Denholm Elliot and Honor Blackman. The movie is all the more disappointing since it wound up being the original Hammer Studio’s final offering. (4/10)


How to be a Serial Killer (2008)
Kind of like “Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer,” if “Henry” was a comedy. It has a similar story, of a veteran serial killer taking on an apprentice and teaching him the modes of murders. The big difference is that Mike is an up-beat can-do kind of guy, who uses serial killing to make the world a better place, while his student Bart is willing but kind of reluctant.

One of the really interesting aspects of the film is there are “instructional,” inspirational speaker style interludes with Mike, done in the style of a late night infomercial, often commenting on or reinforcing the plot. Even odder insertions are documentary style interviews with many of the supporting characters. You’d think these out-of-stories moments would disrupt the story’s pace but, surprisingly, they don’t. Instead, they reinforce the wryly comical tone.

Midway through the film, a major supporting character is killed off, rather unexpectedly and off-screen. In a sequence somewhat reminiscent of “American Psycho,” Mike, in order to cover up one witness, ends up having to kill every single person in his apartment complex. After this sudden story move, the movie is never quite as amusing as it was before. Most of this is forgiven once the conclusion, which is blatantly sympathetic to our serial killer, comes around. I really didn’t have a lot of expectations for “How to be a Serial Killer” but it’s pretty clever. (7/10)


Scissors (1991)
After reading a review on Kindertrauma, I decided to give this film a look, one I probably wouldn’t have check out otherwise. “Scissors” is a mess, but it’s hysterical, high-camp tone makes it an entertaining mess. Sharon Stone plays a repressed, doll-collecting, emotionally disturbed 26-year old virgin. (Take a moment to stifle your laughter.) After being assaulted by a red-bearded man in an elevator, and fending him off with a pair of scissors, she takes comfort in the arms of her neighbor, a gentle, kind of nerdy soap actor played by Steven Railsback. Sadly, the neighbor has got a creepy, paraplegic twin brother, also played by Railsback. In the first few minutes of the film, Stone has her butt patted by an overly friendly shop owner and, from that point on, the movie goes to great lengths to point out Stone’s sexual repression. Her relationship with the good brother and her fear, paranoia, and antagonistic relationship with the creepy brother dominates the first 45 minutes of the film. Despite so much attention being paid to it, this subplot turns out to be nothing but a red harring, building up to nothing, and never quite gets resolved.

Almost half way over with does the movie actually get to its point, with Stone locked in a strange apartment, with a dead body, a talking raven, bolted down furniture, a miniature version of the city that has a pre-recorded message over it, and televisions that play back her memories. It doesn’t take long for her to go completely nuts. If you pay attention to which actors get billing, it won’t be hard to figure out who’s really behind all of this.

Stone’s performance is wide-eyed, shrill, and becomes increasingly hysterical as the movie goes on. Railsback hams it up as the creepy brother while Ronny Cox sleepwalks through a supporting role. The score is as bombastic as anything else in the movie, but its main theme is actually a bit on the creepy side. The film’s lurid set design is colorful and interesting. Though it seems to take a long time to get there, the ironic ending is pretty amusing. “Scissors” certainly isn’t a good film but I don’t regret watching it. It’s not quite like anything else you’ll see. (6/10)

Halloween 2011: October 6

Aberration (1997)
This movie really goes to lengths to justify its premise: Giant killer geckoes (Yes, geckoes.) that adapt to wounds and weaknesses faster then the Borg. This is a pretty goofy place to start. But then the movie is set in the isolated mountainous countryside during the middle of a blizzard, habitat and weather geckoes usually don’t inhabit. And then the Russian mafia gets involved…

The lizards are played, most of the time, by half-way convincing puppets, but a few times the movie substitutes them with really awful early CGI or cheesy hand-puppets. The lizards reproduce like crazy and lots of them get squished, accompanied by the cheesiest stock “squish” sound-effect you can imagine.

The movie has some occasional moments of self-aware humor. The hero of the piece is a limp-wristed science nerd who gets blinded (the geckoes spray venom too, by the way), can’t shoot for shit, and sets himself on fire throughout the course of the film before suddenly transforming into an uber-confident one-line slinging badass at the end. The movie might have been going for an Ash style transition, but this guy sure ain’t Bruce Campbell. There’s a couple other absurd one-liners thrown in and the Russian mobster blowing away dozens of mutant geckoes in seconds, spraying the room with lots of fake blood, is so absurd that it had to be intentional. The movie isn’t very good but I do have to admire its old-fashion schlocky style. The performances are kind of amiable and the movie gets some okay mileage out of its New Zealand setting. It doesn’t have much charm but MST3k-ready creature features are few and far between these days. (5/10)

Watchers (1988)
I think the “Watchers” franchise is probably the last major eighties horror franchise (if you could call it major), that I haven’t gotten to yet. Though a cult classic, the series has never exactly garnered a lot of critical favor. (And Dean Koontz fans seem to hate it. But, being Dean Koontz fans, I don’t value their opinions very highly.) This first one is a pretty fun little slice of eighties camp. Corey Haim isn’t very convincing as the young male lead, but Michael Ironside is pretty awesome as the ruthless government agent. Most of the film’s charm comes not from the horror element so much as the appeal of having a super smart dog that can play Scrabble with you. People getting torn apart by a guy in a not-totally-convincing orangutan suit has its own entertainment value, of course. And, admittedly, the movie does a fairly decent job of disguising the shoddy suit, at least until the end.

The climax of the movie, where Corey goes commando on the monsters, is well-known among schlock fans. It’s not as hilarious as I heard. And, slight spoiler alert here, but you wouldn’t think the “Ultimate Killing Machine,” that the government invested so much money in, could be taken down by a faceful of buckshot. “Watchers” is dumb fun. I bet it makes great stumble-upon late night cable viewing. (7/10)

The Guardian (1990)
Despite directing one of the greatest horror films of all time, William Friedkin really isn’t a horror filmmaker. “Cruising” kind of counts (I certainly think it does), but this is his sole other foray into the genre, and not a particularly well-regarded one either. It’s strange, off-center film.

Nonthreatening horror threats seem to be an unintentional theme tonight. While a killer tree might sound campy on paper, the movie handles it with complete seriousness. The scene of an animated tree tearing a trio of punks apart is both absurd and somehow unnerving. There are a couple of moments like that in the movie. An early nightmare sequence is pretty creepy. The sequence with the wolves does a good job of building intensity, but undermines it when one of the wolves pulls a Nicholson-in-The-Shining, sans “Here’s Johnny!” of course. (Though that would have been kind of awesome.) The endangerment of an infant provides the film with an unseemly, jittery nervous quality. Seeing as how the movie totally goes there in its opening minutes, you know literally anybody can go, creating a grim atmosphere. The exact nature of the evil babysitter/Druid/tree lady is handled in a surreal, sometimes effective way. The movie is pretty gory in spots, especially the finale. Gore is obviously used here not to titillate but in an attempt to unnerve.

But, still… Killer tree. It’s hard to escape the absurdity of that. “The Guardian” left me feeling, not so much disturbed, as slightly disquieted. And not by its content but by its odd pacing, presentation, and tone. I’m not really sure what Friedkin’s interest in the odd-ball material was and he isn’t trying to make another “Exorcist” here, except when he is. This is just a weird, uneven film. (5/10)

Demons of the Mind (1972)
A deeply psychological film about insanity, incest, and murder among an isolated aristocratic family. This certainly isn’t your typical Hammer film. Indeed, the lack of any supernatural elements or exploitation that you normally associate with the company makes this something of a slow burn. The movie builds and builds as a quack hypnotist tries to help the patriarch of the family prevent his self-fulfilling prophecy of insanity. (That this insanity is based on a failed performance on his wedding night adds extra Freudian flavor to the story.)

The movie is intensely acted and directed but it really didn’t have me sold until the very end, when things finally go off the rails into carnage. “Demons of the Mind” is ambitious and worth seeing, but it’s not exactly the light horror viewing you’ve come to expect of Hammer. (7/10)