MY CALL: If you want grim reapers, satanic cults, unlucky hitchhikers, devil worship, the worst leg injury ABSOLUTELY EVER, amateur surgery, home invasions, demons and trips to Hell and back, then this is for you. Not all the short films hit home runs but the few great moments make it worth the gory price of admission. Overall, this is a pretty good anthology. MOVIES LIKE Southbound: This movie most closely matches the stylings of Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985), A Christmas Horror Story (2015) and Trick ‘r Treat (2007).

OTHER HORROR ANTHOLOGIES:  Dead of Night (1945), Black Sabbath (1963), Tales from the Crypt (1972), The Vault of Horror (1973), The Uncanny (1977), Creepshow (1982), Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985), Deadtime Stories (1986), Creepshow 2 (1987), Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990), Necronomicon: Book of the Dead (1993), Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996), Campfire Tales (1997), 3 Extremes (2004), Creepshow 3 (2006), Trick ‘r Treat (2007), Chillerama (2011), Little Deaths (2011), V/H/S (2012), The Theater Bizarre (2012), The ABCs of Death (2013), V/H/S 2 (2013), The Profane Exhibit (2013), The ABCs of Death 2 (2014), V/H/S Viral (2014) and A Christmas Horror Story (2015).

If you’ve followed my reviews for a while now then you ought to know that I love horror anthologies. Typically either all of the short stories are directed by one man and written by another (e.g., Creepshow), or each short story has a different writer and director (e.g., V/H/S). However, this anthology features five stories with six writers and six directors: the trio of Radio Silence (V/H/S segment 10/31/98), Patrick Horvath (The Pact II), David Bruckner (V/H/S segment Amateur Night) and Roxanne Benjamin (V/H/S, V/H/S 2, V/H/S Viral).

Unlike many anthologies which feature a story teller or wraparound story (e.g., Creepshow, Tales from the Darkside: The Movie), this takes the approach of linked stories in which one component of the previous story links us to the next (much as in Trick ‘r Treat)–although it does loop us back to the opening story.

The Way In. The opening finds two men driving southbound on a desert highway. Covered in blood, trapped in some sort of timeloop and followed by several black flying angels of death, they have clearly done something very bad. This was a really sleek and cool short. The special effects and CGI are impressive. At one point a very cool looking grim reaper reaches down a guy’s throat tearing his mouth and jaw into a macabre gaping mess.

Siren. The next morning three girls in the same area hit the road only to get the cliché flat tire. But fret not–they’re offered a ride, dinner and a place to say with a weird couple having a dinner party that evening with their equally weird neighbors and their even weirder twin sons. When they say grace let’s just say it sounded like they weren’t thanking our Heavenly Father. Outside of some vomit and a lot of tongue-in-cheek social awkwardness, this short was relatively uneventful. Somewhat interesting, but somewhat boring as well.

The Accident. One of the girls (Fabianne Therese; Starry Eyes) from Siren escapes the satanic ritual and is brutally, gorily and hilariously hit by a car, the driver of which now endures a most stressful and unhelpful 911 call trying to help her–it’s both soul-crushing and hilarious. Her legs are bent all over the place, she’s convulsing…I was shocked the guy didn’t panic and run. He takes her to what seems to be a recently abandoned town and into an empty hospital where he is advised by some surgeon (over the phone who knows far too much about the situation) to set her broken leg, intubate her, make an incision under her ribs to insert his hand inside her thorax to compress her lung! This is BRUTAL. First off, I never thought a broken leg scene in a horror movie could make me reel, wince, yell at the screen and uncomfortably laugh more than Insidious Chapter 3 (2015). But this movie wins–again folks, I was yelling at the screen LOL. It’s so gleefully macabre and awful and wonderful as we hear the bloody tissue twist and slice and see the victim’s face as she, fully awake, endures all this. HOLY SHIT this short was amazing!

Compounding all this is that after he fails to save her, he is somehow trapped in the abandoned hospital! This short alone is worth watching this movie.

Jailbreak, the fourth short, strangely deviates from the more distinctly linked second and third as a man battles demons in a gory bar fight in search of his sister, who evidently has been in Hell for a long time. The special effects range from marginal to decent with some gooey splatters, but the story was completely uncompelling. I felt no satisfaction by the ending other than the relief that we were moving on to the work of other filmmakers.

The Way Out feels a lot like the home invasion from You’re Next (2013). It’s a little scary, moderately creepy, and packs some good shock value as a tough girl stands up to defend her family from a group of murderous masked home intruders. But what makes this final short interesting is that it links back all the way to the The Way In, which felt like the beginning of our timeline as we watched. Some of the “gates to Hell” CGI were a little cheesy, but they depicted some cool infernal imagery nonetheless.

I thought The Way In was nifty, especially how it linked to The Way Out, and that The Accident alone was worth the price of admission. Sure, not all the shorts were awesome. But therein lies the luxury of anthology films; it takes about ten minutes to figure out you don’t like a particular short, and by then you only have about ten more minutes until it’s over and you’re on to the next. And because each short has a different writer and director, you can rest assured that it will have a completely different style.

This was entertaining and at times pretty clever. The big take home message for me to sell you on this though would have to be the injuries of the girl in The Accident. WORST BROKEN LEG EVERRRRRR! Mercy! Overall, this is a pretty good anthology.

MY CALL: Even without discretely defined villains, torrid love affairs, explosions reflecting on sweaty biceps or monsters fighting robots, there are films whose very unfolding provokes powerful reactions of sentiment, self-reflection and moral justice within us. The Big Short is one of those films! If not the best film of the year, I’d posit this to be the best filmmaking of the year. Don’t miss this. MORE MOVIES LIKE The Big Short: Recount (2008), Margin Call (2011), Too Big to Fail (2011), Game Change (2012), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), The News Room (2012-2014), Freakonomics (2010) and Moneyball (2011).

The Big Short is an edgy, contemporary film utilizing comically informative fourth-wall-breaking asides and surprise cameos by celebrities explaining economic concepts in layman’s terms. This is basically the Deadpool (2016) of exposé-style financial movies, so let’s try not to miss this one!

As the story unfolds and we delve deep into the investment banking world, we cut to interjections like “and now here’s Margot Robbie drinking champagne in a bathtub” and she (Margot Robbie; Suicide Squad, The Wolf of Wall Street), as herself, explains the terminology and investment strategy in question. There are other surprise celebrity cameos and I’ll dare not spoil any more for you…just know that they add something very special to this already exceptional film and keep it from being anything but boring. Actually, I found it wildly entertaining!

The cast does an amazing job delivering a topic formally most interesting to Forbes-minded, Wall Street Journal-subscribing middle-aged investment bankers. The script is stylishly packaged to appeal to young filmmakers, mainstream movie fans and those who delight in raunchy comedies alike. This may sound unrealistic, but my father and I both loved it. He (a doctor) watches almost nothing but business news in his spare time and I (an entomologist) usually stick to horror and martial arts flicks. This should say something about the compelling appeal about this film. And it’s something exceptional.

Assuming the narrative disclosure’s honesty, the film even delights in pointing out that “yes, that [real life event] really happened” or “well, actually that’s not how it happened.” I found this style most charming. It reminded me of when I nearly pissed myself laughing watching Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson grilling hands in Pain and Gain (2013)–which, according to the movie, was “still a true story” at that point.

The cast finds Marisa Tomei, Steve Carell and Ryan Gosling reuniting from Crazy, Stupid Love (2011). Ryan Gosling (Drive, Only God Forgives) effortlessly slips into the sleek role of Jared Vennett, a character that embraces Gosling’s smooth talking yet jerky charisma while successfully suppressing his Hollywood pervasiveness as a sex symbol.

Meanwhile, just one nervous tick away from full-blown Asperger’s we find Christian Bale (The Dark Knight Rises), who likewise sheds his sex appeal and dominates our attention as the medical doctor-turned-prodigy investor Michael Berryman. We watch as he struggles to wrestle his ill-explained yet thoughtful insights to his hedge fund-managing employers that “just don’t get it.” Not only do they not understand why he would bet against the American mortgage industry (i.e., invest in “shorting” mortgages, hence the title), they actually think he’s gone insane and so does the remainder of the investing world. The data is there, but nobody is looking at it. So they all blindly follow, chant and worship the golden mortgage idol, “the bedrock of the American economy” during the NINJA (i.e., no income, no job, approved) subprime loan era that inflated the bubble whose burst was heard round the world.

Carell and his investment team are somehow likable (to the audience) as a group of otherwise easily dislikable analysts. They serve as our investigators, skeptics-turned-believers in the crusade to expose the great lie beneath. Whereas Bale is the brilliant and somewhat self-interested prodigy seeking to profit from the realized pending bubble, Carell’s team represents our protagonists. Bale is the laughing stock Victor Frankenstein to Carell’s fanatical and oft-doubted Van Helsing.

More closely reminiscent of a misunderstood movie physicist, Bale doesn’t wish to share his insights. Meanwhile Carell is more the whistleblower, the high proselytizer of the truth to Bale’s ill-understood Frankensteinian invention of shorting the real estate market. Carell is a classically guilt-tortured character who channels his energy into making The Big Short into his personal crusade. His mission of discovery reveals only horrors: exotic dancers with five houses, loan officers who brag about submitting mortgage applications for clients with neither jobs nor FICO scores (i.e., NINJA loans), alarming payment delinquency in nice neighborhoods and, worst of all, bogus financial ratings.

From sleek to geek.

As if taking a trip to financial Oz, Bale is the brain, Carell the heart, and Gosling the pretty face from Kansas, but it’s Brad Pitt (Killing Them Softly, World War Z) who breathes harrowing soul into the film. Regardless of the financial or moral incentive, Carell and Bale are most concerned with “being right” and proving it to others. Pitt, however, has no horse in this race and illustrates the terrible reality of what it means to regular, average, tax-paying Americans if all this turns out to be true–and the audience FEELS it because we’ve, in fact, lived through it! But so easily do we forget our hardships long after they’ve passed. This film does a Hell of a job reminding us, even touching those who were not so harmfully left in the wake 10 years ago in the crash.

Director Adam McKay (Stepbrothers, Anchorman 2, The Other Guys), known for his immature manchild R-rated humor flicks, stitches together varying and familiar filming styles into this contemporary masterpiece that is sure to please. I was quite impressed and honestly never wanted this movie to end. The powerful emotional response I felt was tremendous. I was reminded of my reactions to such films as The Adjustment Bureau (2011), Rush (2013), Castaway (2000) and A River Runs Through It (1992).

Among Ex-Machina (2015) and Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), The Big Short was among the best films of the year! Maybe tied for my favorite of the year, and not a single CGI alien or machine gun to be found!

Even without discretely defined villains, torrid love affairs, brilliant orange explosions reflecting on glistening sweaty inflated biceps or giant CGI monsters fighting giant CGI robots, there are films whose very unfolding provokes powerful reactions of sentiment, self-reflection and moral justice within us. The Big Short is one of those films! If not the best film of the year, I’d posit this to be the best filmmaking of the year and among five Academy Award nominations it won for Best Adapted Screenplay. Don’t miss this!

MY CALL: A low-budget Irish witch movie boasting some cool ideas and neat low-budget practical effects, but cursed with major plot holes and terrible, terrible writing (and direction, I suppose). Definitely not unwatchable, I’d consider it a laughably bad movie with a few moderately redeeming features. MOVIES LIKE Cherry Tree:  Some other Irish horror movies include Rawhead Rex (1986; pretty bad but watchable), Leprechaun Origins (2014; horrible), Leprechaun 2 (1994; decent), Leprechaun (1993; campy but excellent), Grabbers (2012; AMAZING) and The Hallow (2015; EXCELLENT). Also check out Holidays (2016), which features an Irish short story (Mother’s Day).

MORE WITCH MOVIES:  For better witch movies I’ll suggest Warlock (1989), The Witch (2016), The Witches of Eastwick (1987), The Craft (1996) and The Witches (1990), the campy The Kiss (1988) and Spellbinder (1988) are entertaining but bad, the dark noir Lord of Illusions (1995), and Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 (2000) and The Blair Witch Project (1999) were cool considering you never see a witch. And check out Pumpkinhead (1988) for a great depiction of a witch, though it’s not a “witch movie.” Definitely skip Witchcraft (1989). Lords of Salem (2013) and Mother of Tears (2007) deal with witches in different ways and Snow White and the Huntsman (2012), The Last Witch Hunter (2015) and Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013) offer action and effects-driven fun. Beautiful Creatures (2013) and The Woods (2006) may appeal to younger audiences. Superstition (1982) and The Haunting of Morella (1990) are allegedly witch movies but don’t feel like it. Deadtime Stories (1986) features a pretty cool witch short story.

I had been looking forward to this Irish witch movie despite the scathing reviews (discussed here). That said, I’m glad I watched it…but it wasn’t exactly good.

Witches had occupied the town of Orchard since the Middle Ages, their coven constantly seeking a woman to bear the son of Satan so that they may gain untold power. After dispatching of the coven, folk tales suggested that the spirits of these witches were linked to an old cherry tree, and through that tree they could return.

A virgin high school field hockey player at odds with her teammates, Faith (Naomi Battrick) would do anything to save terminally ill father (Sam Hazeldine; The Raven, The Wolfman). And she is approached by her new field hockey coach to do just that.  Sissy (Anna Walton; Hellboy II: The Golden Army) readily explains that she has access to magical powers that could cure Faith’s father and demonstrates such proficiency by killing and resurrecting a chicken with what I can only describe as “centipede magic.”

Building up to this, whatever the filmmakers were trying to do in order to drum up dramatic tension–school bullies, her father’s health, ill-temperament–it isn’t working for me. And when Coach Sissy takes Faith to her home, a manor of wealth far beyond a high school hockey coach, it’s creepy and viney and has stairs descending to untold depths below ground level leading to her ritual basement where she asks “do you believe in magic?”  She goes so far as to explain that their “Lord” would reward them with dark power for their devotion.  Why Faith didn’t just freak out at this lunacy or call the police is quite the curiosity.  I don’t care how sick her father is.  Who would believe this crap in the era of the internet and cable TV!?!?!

The price for magically saving her father: a child. Let’s just say the sex scene that consummates this prerequisite is interesting, demonic and, of course, includes a centipede or two.

The direction is uninspired, featuring amateur shots with occasionally nice cinematography that was not at all complimented by the set designers’ attempts to create a witches den. It strikes me more like a well-designed basement-turned-house of horrors on Halloween.

The centipedes, of course, offer some level of creep factor but otherwise really don’t “fit” in the scenes and their sound effects are exaggerated over-the-top. Not that I don’t like seeing centipedes on the walls, biting people with unrealistic power, and crawling into wounds and bodily orifices and under flesh. It’s just more “neat” than “good.”  Why are these centipedes even here!?!?!  There is also a lot of cherry imagery (which has me pondering connections to The Witches of Eastwick), some kind of twig and slimy web cocoon (that makes no sense and is no more explained than the centipedes), and a gross birth scene.

So is it just me?  Or does her head look strikingly similar to the centipede’s hind legs clutching the cherry on the poster art?

This film is shameless with its tropes, depicting a shower scene of high school girls complete with nudity, along with subsequent nudity during a ritual, a demonic sex scene, and yet another breasty ritual scene. That said, Anna Walton–who accounts for two of those scenes–is a visual delight.

Director David Keating (Wake Wood) has produced a melee of ideas that find no sense of synthesis.  It strikes me that a very serious effort was made to make a good film, but the story falls apart at almost every turn with plot holes.  Faith disappeared from school for three weeks, her friend who saw her weeks later wasn’t very disturbed by Faith’s full-term pregnancy, why the Hell didn’t the witches have her locked up in the final hour before the birth of the Devil’s son (Faith just sneaks out the front door), and why would Sissy explain the details of her ritual so that Faith would know exactly how to stop it!  Just painfully bad writing.

And why would they lock her in a car, light it on fire, then leave???  That’s like when Dr. Evil closes the doors on Austin Powers tied up over the shark tank!

Not that this film is by any means unwatchable–it’s entertaining enough–but if there was a reason for me to actually recommend this film it would probably be for some of the practical effects in the final act or, simply put, Anna Walton’s boobs. We find an interesting transformation scene complete with peeling off bloody chunks of flesh revealing a new creepy form beneath that pretty cool but doesn’t show us nearly as much as we’d like to see.  However some effects fall on the laughably cheap side of things.

Overall, I’d say these filmmakers failed at making a good witch movie. But they succeeded at showing me a lot of cool ideas, stretching a budget efficiently and showing a few decent effects along the way, although paved with horrible storytelling and idiotic oversights by our villains.

I recently reviewed the short film Scythe (2016), whose Kickstarter Campaign has just one day left and $7000 to go. If this is going to happen people NEED TO PLEDGE NOW!

This promising slasher short film largely offers aspects of horror tropes that I enjoy. If you feel the same, consider contributing to their Kickstarter Campaign.  They’re almost there!!!!!  If you believe in this film, even a little, put what you can–even just $5–towards making this happen and share in your social media networks.

MORE INDIE MOVIES LIKE Scythe: Here at MFF we occasionally do horror short film and pre-release indie film reviews on request. Among recent solicited promotions are Order of the Ram (2013; short film), Love in the Time of Monsters (2014; feature length), Smothered (2014; feature length), In the Dark (2015; feature length), Trailer Talk: The Void, TRAILER TALK: Blood Money, Short Film Buzz: Burn (2016; press release), Brother (2016; short film), and the indie techno-horror Other Halves (2016; feature length).

Description: Directed/written by Jim Rothman and starring Jose C. Alvarez, Zailee Madrigal and Andrea Muller, Scythe is a psychological Slasher/Thriller in the same vein of Halloween (1978), Saw (2004) and the work of Hitchcock.

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Right about now would be a good time for you to stop reading and give this short film a watch. No worries, it’s just a smooth 12 minutes. Then we’ll get back to our critique…

To watch the short film CLICK HERE

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If you want to be a part of something in the world of horror THIS IS YOUR CHANCE.
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The perks for supporting this campaign are pretty generous.

MY CALL: This horror anthology features monstrous pregnancy, creepy kids, zombie Jesus, genital mutilation, pagan cults, teen bullying gone wrong, the evil Easter bunny and deadly Dating site meet-ups among other maladies. Definitely one of the better horror anthologies of the last several years. MOVIES LIKE Holidays: Other holiday themed horror anthologies include Trick ‘r Treat (2007), Tales of Halloween (2015) and A Christmas Horror Story (2015).

OTHER HORROR ANTHOLOGIES:  Dead of Night (1945), Black Sabbath (1963), Tales from the Crypt (1972), The Vault of Horror (1973), The Uncanny (1977), Creepshow (1982), Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985), Deadtime Stories (1986), Creepshow 2 (1987), Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990), Necronomicon: Book of the Dead (1993), Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996), Campfire Tales (1997), 3 Extremes (2004), Creepshow 3 (2006), Trick ‘r Treat (2007), Chillerama (2011), Little Deaths (2011), V/H/S (2012), The Theater Bizarre (2012), The ABCs of Death (2013), V/H/S 2 (2013), The Profane Exhibit (2013), The ABCs of Death 2 (2014), V/H/S Viral (2014), Southbound (2015), Tales of Halloween (2015) and A Christmas Horror Story (2015).

If you’ve followed my reviews for a while now then you ought to know that I love horror anthologies. In some anthologies all of the short stories are directed by one man and written by another (e.g., Creepshow), but in this case each short story has a different writer and director (like V/H/S).

Unlike many anthologies which feature a story teller or wraparound story (e.g., Creepshow, Tales from the Darkside: The Movie) or taking the approach of linked stories in which one component of the previous story links us to the next (e.g., Southbound, Trick ‘r Treat), this anthology simply delivers a series of horror shorts related only in that they are all holiday-themed. The shorts are presented in their calendar order and all have delightfully twisted endings. This anthology really was a pleasant surprise.

Valentine’s Day introduces us to a quiet high school girl (Madeleine Coghlan) bullied by her diving team and teased about her crush on their coach. The tone is uneasingly awkward and when the young girls bully it makes us uncomfortable (in a good, effective way). Written and directed by Dennis Widmyer and Kevin Kolsch (they did Starry Eyes), this breezy short takes a hard turn when the victim gets her brutal revenge. You’ll smile.

St. Patrick’s Day is tremendously effective in its awkwardness as well, and follows suit in the creepy kids department. An Irish primary school teacher (Ruth Bradley; Grabbers) is haunted by a strange student and a stranger subsequent pregnancy. Only, pregnant with what…and how…and why? It’s funny in the darkest way. The birth scene is interesting followed by a most dream-like celebration. Written and directed by Gary Shore (Dracula Untold).

Easter is just plain wrong in ways that made my darkest side squeal with glee. A young girl encounters a most sacrilegious zombie Jesus Easter Bunny that births baby chicks from its stigmata. Wow. Written and directed by Nicholas McCarthy (The Pact), this is something different.

Mother’s Day. All sorts of weirdness ensues after a young woman who can’t stop getting pregnant joins a fertility ritual for women who can’t. I can’t say I understand the ending and this was just plain odd. Written and directed by Sarah Adina Smith, this short was among my least favorites.

Father’s Day was easily the most compelling and tense of the shorts in this anthology. A young woman (Jocelin Donahue; The House of the Devil, Insidious Chapter 2) receives a tape recorder with a message from her father–who she thought had died 20+ years ago–with instructions on how to find him. Written and directed by Anthony Scott Burns, I desperately want this guy to do more horror!!! Maybe even stretch this into an entire movie.

Halloween disappointingly had nothing to do with Halloween at all. It’s the only short in this anthology that fails to follow the theme of its holiday and, on top of that, it’s a crass shock film that fails at being shocking. It wasn’t well acted or well written and I must say I was surprised to see this garbage was written and directed by Kevin Smith (Tusk).

Christmas stars Seth Green (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) as a man tasked with getting the latest hot tech gift for his son. But how far will he go to get it, and what will he learn about himself when he does? Written and directed by Scott Stewart (Dark Skies, Priest, Legion), this one is cheeky.

New Year’s Eve was definitely the most fun. A murderous man meets a quirky woman on a Dating site for a NYE date that does not go as he planned. Directed by Adam Egypt Mortimer (Some Kind of Hate), this short gives me hope that he will make more such movies.

In general I was very pleased with this horror anthology. I liked it even more than Southbound (2015)! Probably the only disappointing shorts for me were Mother’s Day and Kevin Smith’s Halloween, which was the only short that didn’t connect well with its assigned holiday and it had probably the worst acting, writing and–sorry Kevin–directing. It just felt like amateur hour despite some mildly campy humor…and it didn’t match its surroundings well. For me the best short was Father’s Day–just harrowing. But basically all of these shorts (except, Mother’s Day and Halloween) were very satisfying. Few anthologies are of such quality.

MY CALL: Part 1 stunned us with brutality and desperation. But part 2 was made to push the gory and psychological aspects into disturbing territory. I loved this film and clearly so did Rob Zombie, who claimed that House of 1000 Corpses (2003) was in honor of the horror era of the past–but really, and not to his discredit, it seemed that he was re-imagining this.. MORE MOVIES LIKE The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2: Well obviously you should have already seen The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). From there I’d suggest seeing The Funhouse (1981) and Motel Hell (1980) before moving on to the much better TCM 2. After that, you could skip to the rebooted series (2003, 2006), perhaps excluding Texas Chainsaw 3-D (2013)– I wasn’t at all thrilled with it as a Texas Chainsaw movie, but I generally LOVED it as a bad horror flick!

After a narrated introduction linking our story to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and explaining the aftermath of Sally’s escape, we meet a pair of yuppie shithead sociopaths shooting road signs and playing chicken with locals on rural roads while donning preppie attire like pastel sweaters and frat house blazers. They obnoxiously cackle and, unlike our gang of victims in part 1, we are all probably looking forward to their well-deserved gruesome deaths.

Not only do they get what they deserve, but it happens in a manner far more gory and campy than anything in part 1. Leatherface (now played by Bill Johnson; The Caretakers) has a slapstick vibe about him as he chainsaws a moving vehicle while wearing an entire dead shambling corpse as a disguise. Taking a hard turn from the hopelessly desperate and dire original, this new campy tone emanates throughout this sequel and takes more after Tobe Hooper’s own The Funhouse (1981).

Compounding this silliness is that we find Drayton Sawyer (Jim Siedow; The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) taking very much after the campy Motel Hell‘s (1980) Farmer Vincent, winning a chili cook-off and being praised for his tasty meat stew. Like The Funhouse (1981), Motel Hell borrowed heavily from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), embracing cannibalism, a macabre pig head mask, and a chainsaw attack. Now it seems that TCM 2 is borrowing back.

Radio DJ Stretch (Caroline Williams; Leprechaun 3, Halloween II, Hatchet 3, Contracted) is the best part of this movie. She and her producer (Lou Perryman; The Cellar, Poltergeist) heard the aforementioned yuppie victims (one with the top of his head awesomely sawed off) being killed when they obnoxiously called in to her radio show. So Stretch rushes to help Lefty (Dennis Hopper; Waterworld, Land of the Dead) in his investigation of his nephews’ death, which he believes to have been at the hands of the purported chainsaw-wielding maniacs 12 years prior.

Of course, the Sawyer family is back and Chop-Top (Bill Moseley; House of 1000 Corpses, Texas Chainsaw 3D, House) is batshit crazy and disturbingly awkward. He is so sick and twisted that I felt scared for Stretch when she faced him–and I, a well-seasoned and desensitized horror buff, never feel scared for anyone except for the Poltergeist (1982; also Tobe Hooper, by the way) family! The violence goes off the deep end when he hammers the shit out of her friend over and over again…with an actual hammer…cackling all the while. Whereas Leatherface is as sexually repressed and perverse as can be, essentially chainsaw dry-humping while licking his malformed lips.

It’s pretty sick and it really paved the way for subsequent sicko releases like House of 1000 Corpses (2003). All the while, these encounters show us how strong Caroline Williams plays our final girl Stretch. She’s terrified and manic, but she fights back and defends herself however she can, even by psychologically manipulating the man-child Leatherface.

As we approach the third act Stretch falls into the deep underground lair of the Sawyers, Leatherface skins sopping corpses and plays with peeled bloody faces, and Lefty goes mad with vengeance intent on caving in the Sawyers’ abandoned mines. The festival macabre continues with puppeteered corpses and insane rants. Offal pits and halls of rotting corpses abound in this craziness that you will subsequently find duplicated in House of 1000 Corpses (2003; in honorarium) and Stretch runs for her life through the maze of dead bodies in her short shorts screaming.

Writer/director Tobe Hooper (Lifeforce, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Poltergeist, The Funhouse) returns and shifts gears from brutal and dire to slapstick gory batshit crazy. In an effort to one-up his own work, the Sawyer home and dinner scene are elevated to an “11” in terms of lunacy, the chase scenes are longer and the gruesome actions find far more blood, severed limbs, rended flesh and rubber guts than its predecessor.

Grandpa is evil senescence at its best as he hammers Stretch, Leatherface is now borderline invincible and able to fight Lefty with a chainsaw through his stomach with his guts hanging out, scrappy Stretch gets into a fight with Chop-Top that endures so long that it set the standard for Keith David and Roddy Piper in They Live (1988)…it seems EVERYTHING has been turned up to an “11” in this crazy sequel.

Just when you thought it couldn’t get more over the top Stretch ends up at Grandma Sawyer’s shrine and does the same crazy chainsaw kata as Leatherface in the end of part 1. That’s what I love about this movie. You keep thinking it can’t get any crazier, but it somehow does. It’s like Jurassic Park (1993), “crazy” finds a way.

Part 1 stunned us with brutality and desperation. But part 2 was made to push the gory and psychological aspects into disturbing territory. I loved this film and clearly so did Rob Zombie, who claimed that House of 1000 Corpses (2003) was in honor of the horror era of the past–but really, and not to his discredit, it seemed that he was re-imagining this.

MY CALL: Excellent acting, writing and scenery breathe life into this intensely paranoid indie horror in which matrimonial trust is tested. A must see! MOVIES LIKE Honeymoon: Bite (2015), Spring (2015) and The Hallow (2015) all test relationships with monstrosities. There are other much more similar movies, but to merely identify them would spoil this movie. Although the tagline, IMDB summary and posters are a bit obvious and spoilerish already.

First time writer/director Leigh Janiak does an excellent job introducing us to our recently married main characters Bea (Rose Leslie; Game of Thrones, The Last Witch Hunter) and Paul (Harry Treadaway; Penny Dreadful, Cockneys vs Zombies). They are the normal, sweet, likable and nuanced characters horror fans deserve.

This film is in no rush. We take our time getting to know the newlyweds and, although they do honeymoon in a cabin in the woods, it’s not as secluded and troped up as it sounds. The role of the “harbinger” is understated and there is nothing campy to be found. Janiak is staging a proper horror film for us.

One night Paul finds Bea wandering naked in the woods and afterwards she just isn’t the same. She forgets how to make coffee and French toast, and becomes generally more distant whereas prior to her nude midnight stroll they couldn’t keep their hands off each other. Something is clearly wrong and right away Paul knows it. He just doesn’t know what exactly is wrong…or why.

As someone who has been in a few very serious relationships in my time, Bea’s odd behavior was palpably uncomfortable and it really hit home for me. I could only imagine the emotional terror Paul must have felt when Bea suddenly took such a change, and on their honeymoon no less! Their on-screen chemistry is strong, so it’s all the worse when the paranoia sets in.

The effects are not abundant but they accomplish exactly what they need to, being weird and gross and slimy. Just the way I like them! Normally I’m more descriptive about effects, but they’re too integral to the story revelations and I don’t want to spoil it.  [At the end of this review, after the movie poster below, there are images depicting the special effects…I suggest you only look if you’ve already seen the movie.]

The acting is excellent, the atmosphere breeds unease, and this is among few movies that have made me nervous for the main characters. What a cool film. You should definitely catch it while it’s on Netflix.

If I had one complaint it would be that the ending is completely unresolved. But it’s cool anyway. I want more films like this! And so does Mark, who also loved this film… Mark’s Review Here.

MY CALL: I struggle to truly call this horror, rather this feels more like a violent drama featuring a supernatural character. It lacks any substantial plot or character development…yet I really enjoyed it! MOVIES LIKE He Never Died:  This is one of those modern indie horrors that transcends its genre a bit such that we may throw out a term like “horror hybrid.” To that end, I’d suggest films like Spring (2015), Honeymoon (2014) and A Girl Walks Home Alone (2014)–all of which focus more on the relationships therein than their encapsulating horror themes.

Written and directed by Jason Krawczyk, this snarky little film delivers Henry Rollins (Feast, Bad Boys 2) exactly as he should be–immortal, gruff and unable to feel pain or emotions.  Rollins plays Jack, a no nonsense man of few words, simple means, and a solid respect for privacy.  He keeps to himself and leaves his simplistically unfestive apartment for little more than church bingo, his favorite diner or to meet a hospital intern (Booboo Stewart; X-Men: Days of Future Past) for an illegal exchange of sorts.

Somehow Jack crosses paths with some screw-up criminals who find out the hard way that Jack is not the man to cross. And when you cross him, his temper is short and consequences are grave.  A nice slow throat rip, a dash of cannibalism and a few well-handled punches to the face add a unique flavor to this very dark comedy which presents itself surprisingly like an off-Broadway play in terms of atmosphere and delivery.

Jack is like an occasionally kind sociopath trying to (quite successfully) fend off any vestige of human emotion that may well up inside him while likewise staving back a strange macabre compulsion from a deep and distant, perhaps Biblical past. At one point Jack rather audibly removes a bullet from his head–it was a pleasure!

Nothing Oscar-worthy, but I really enjoyed Rollins’ depiction of Jack–rendered stolid from centuries of monotonous life. He has strong aversions to conversation, he answers questions literally and concisely, and does a good job revealing as little as possible about himself.  But I suppose if I had what appear angel wing excision scars, I’d be keeping more than a few secrets myself.  That said, his interactions–few as they may be and always forced upon him–are amusingly awkward.

Despite the deliberate lack of a plot that matters or any form of proper character development, this remains a pretty cool movie. Highly recommended to indie horror fans, indie movie fans in general or anyone who likes Henry Rollins for any reason.

MY CALL: Booooooring. This is just some hardly serviceable anime action with a cool premise but a so-so story that sees too little development, generally uninteresting characters and uninspired bad guys. Maybe the fault lies in my favoritism to dark fantasy. But I won’t be watching this again or recommending it.  I should point out that a lot of Amazon reviewers called this the best Anime Sci-Fi “ever.” So take my opinion with a grain of salt…or the whole shaker.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Cyber City Oedo 808: Best bets would probably be Black Magic M-66 (1987) and Dominion Tank Police (1988). And of course check out Vampire Hunter D (1985), Demon City Shinjuku (1988) and Wicked City (1987) for more supernatural fare.

The first thing I noticed about this Anime was the animation quality. While the robots, vehicles and cityscapes were illustrated and animated with stunning acuity, the characters and the action seemed a noticeable step below Wicked City (1987) and Vampire Hunter D (1985), to name a couple.

Far in the future in a world of advanced technology, spaceships and cybernetics, three criminals are offered reductions from their 300-year prison sentences for each cyber-criminal they manage to detain. When we first met Makie (Wicked City) and D (Vampire Hunter D), they had instant appeal and offered backgrounds of intrigue or mystery. At present, we are simply introduced to three prisoners: Sengoku, the androgynous Benten with long white hair and red fingernails, and the very large Gogul with a visor or sorts.

[I purchased this with all three episodes of the mini-series combined together.]

Data 1: Memories of the Past. Our first and brief bad guy has some sort of laser claw replacing one of his forearms. It’s kinda ‘dumb. Moreover, I find that as more action sequences with various robotic foes come to pass, they are generally brief and unexciting.

The most satisfying aspect of this mini-series is the C3PO-like robot Varsus that serves as a parole officer and answer machine generating all manner of obscure odds, identifying strategies and weaknesses, and acting as a talking Suri-Worldwide Web that serves as the butt of Sengoku’s ridicule. Gogul plays tech support as Sengoku works his way through a skyscraper to fight the undead consciousness of a long dead computer engineer who somehow telekinetically controls machinery wiring like electric tentacles. While it looks cool for a hot minute, the final fight is pretty much a letdown.

Data 2: The Decoy Program. This second episode was even less compelling than the first. A few too many plot-points get tangled as Gogul faces off against a psychic cyborg with go-go-Gadget arms.

Shocking similarity to the bad guy from Tokyo Gore Police (2008), huh?

Data 3: Crimson Media. The third episode was Benten’s mission to eliminate a virus-afflicted psychic vampire. This was easily the most interesting of the three parts perhaps, given my taste, because it ventured from the “tech crimes” cyber-police theme and more to the supernatural with a weirder villain.

Overall, I found this mini-series to be largely boring. Whereas Wicked City (1987) and Vampire Hunter D (1985) are buckets of awesome in my eyes, this is just some hardly serviceable anime cartoon with a so-so story, generally uninteresting characters and uninspired bad guys. Maybe the fault lies in part with my favoritism to dark fantasy. I’m not sure. But I am sure that I won’t be watching this again or recommending it.

I should point out that a lot of Amazon reviewers called this the best Anime Sci-Fi “ever.” So take my opinion with a grain of salt…or the whole shaker.

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Just a few questionable images for the office.
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MY CALL: In this gory, raunchy, hilarious coming-of-age zombedy, three teenagers rediscover their friendship and renew the awesome resourcefulness that is being a scout…and using those skills for killing zombies. It’s a great ride! MOVIES LIKE Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse: More appropriate horror comedies include Zombie Strippers (2008), Zombieland (2009), Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (2009), Piranha 3D (2010), Tucker and Dale vs Evil (2010), Final Destination 5 (2011; not exactly comedy, but occasionally hilarious), Piranha 3DD (2012), The Cabin in the Woods (2012), The Voices (2014), Smothered (2014), Housebound (2014), Zombeavers (2014), Cooties (2015), Ava’s Possessions (2015), What We Do in the Shadows (2015), The Final Girls (2015), Krampus (2015; not exactly comedy, but occasionally hilarious) and Love in the Time of Monsters (2015).

This movie is rambunctiously scored from start to finish. All horror comedies should be so bold as to have Blake Anderson (Workaholics) twerking down the halls to Iggy Azalea’s Black Widow while mopping the floors. Too bad he dies right away, but the scene is long, hilarious and REALLY gory. What more could you want? Follow that up with stock footage of David Koechner (Final Destination 5, Cheap Thrills, Krampus, Piranha 3DD) as an awkward scout leader in a recruiting video and I think director Christopher Landon (writer for Paranormal Activity 2-5) is off to a great start!

We don’t get very far in this movie before the gore properly reveals itself. It’s a sloppy mess of awesome and this infectious bloody zombiism permeates the animal kingdom to deliver a zombie deer with its guts hanging out.

This flick really delivers and doesn’t stop with the gore. The hormonally raging Ben (Tye Sheridan; The Stanford Prison Experiment), straight-laced Carter (Logan Miller; Would You Rather) and boy scout fanatic Auggie (Joey Morgan; Compadres) are three readily likable high school sophomores with a newfound American Pie-like discovery of women. Their love interests: stripper Denise (Sarah Dumont; Don Jon) and classmate Kendall (Halston Sage; Goosebumps). As if copying from Superbad‘s (2007) class notes, Ben has charged Carter with scoring some beer and getting them to the party that will “change their lives.”

After such an amazing opening act, the movie had to lose a little steam ever so briefly in the middle before returning full steam ahead into lunacy. Even at its slowest point it’s a nice experience. As it comes back full-tilt some people might be a bit bothered by the level of physicality of these zombies (i.e., WWE wrestling moves, jumping on trampolines). But it’s a solidly fun and adventurous horror comedy.

These boys’ misadventures lead them to zombie strippers, challenges of their friendship, zombie boobs, a Britney Spears sing-along, a crazy old cat lady zombie, the crazy old cat lady zombie’s crazy cat zombies, elderly zombie penis stretching and dismemberment, and zombie oral sex. As dirty and perverted as this all sounds it could have been much raunchier and grosser. Trust me, it’s probably nothing that will make you uncomfortable if you enjoyed Piranha 3DD (2012).

In this gory coming-of-age zombedy, these three boys rediscover their friendship and renew the awesome resourcefulness that is being a scout…and using those skills for killing zombies! It’s a great ride!

You’re probably wondering where they got this title?
A kid makes a random comment in the movie about a big blue monkey–that’s it.
Presto! Movie title!

MY CALL: This feisty Aliens (1986) rip-off features a giant mutant praying mantis wreaking havoc in a hospital. If that doesn’t tell you everything you need to know, then I don’t know what else will. MOVIES LIKE Blue Monkey: Slugs (1989) and The Nest (1988) will deliver loads of creepy crawly 80s horror fun.

Many thanks to my online horror buddy, Zane, for sharing this bad 80s masterpiece with me. Zane is a true 80s horror aficionado and even took part in making an 80s style horror film: The Barn. So that’s my “thank you” plug for Zane and his movie. On with the review!

Also released as Invasion of the Body Suckers [no clue where that title came from] and Insect [vague, but appropriate], I love that this movie gets straight to business. After being pricked by a strange exotic plant and passing out, an old man is rushed to the hospital only to have a large white worm emerge from his mouth resulting in his death! The worm parasite quickly gets the entire hospital quarantined when numerous patients begin to show strange symptoms after the arrival of this “insect.”

Some playful young patients come across the specimen and unknowingly feed it a “nucleic acid promoter” that augments growth and hormonal activity…so presumably we’ll have a giant mutant bug in no time. Yaaaay!!!!

Director William Fruet (Goosebumps, War of the Worlds) has made his filmmaking intentions obvious as Ranger Rick meets slimy science fiction in this feisty Aliens (1986) rip-off in which we emulate the infection scene (in the greenhouse with the plant), chestburster scene, the queen alien egg-laying scene complete with flashing blue background lighting, kids and monsters in ventilation shafts like Newt, and slimy secretions galore from a giant insectoid creature that grows at an alarming pace.

They even reproduce the scene in which the queen xenomorph is infuriated by lighting her egg chamber and offspring on fire.

Our biological updates about the praying mantis monster are delivered by the local entomologist (Don Lake; Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Short Circuit 2) and non-scientific exposition comes courtesy of the hospital administrator (John Vernon; Killer Klowns from Outer Space, The Uncanny)–both roles being much appreciated by this 80s horror fan.

There’s plenty of goofy rubber monster suit action in this fun 80s creature feature. We see a lot of our monster and like Peter Pan across the Broadway stage it swings from the ceiling. It’s laughably awesome and there are a few scenes of festive gore.

The film ended with a typically campy twist that left a smile on my face. There was even an implication that two intoxicated patients were spared because of their inebriation–much like Grabbers (2012). If you like any bad 80s horror, then you should enjoy this.

MY CALL: Perhaps not original (generally speaking), but an excellent film! Sure, it’s something I’ve seen many times before. But it was done very well by a filmmaker and cast we can respect. Credibly tough victims are hard to find in the slasher subgenre. So you should give this one a chance. MOVIES LIKE Hush: You’re Next (2013), The Strangers (2008), Vacancy (2007) and The Purge (2013).

Living in quiet seclusion, one random evening deaf novelist Maddie (Kate Siegel; Oculus) finds herself stalked by a masked man (John Gallagher Jr.; 10 Cloverfield Lane, Jonah Hex). We don’t know how or why he chose her, or how he stumbled across her home that night. We only know that he wants the worst for–he wants her to want to die.

Directed by Mike Flanagan (Oculus, Absentia, Before I Wake, Ouija 2) and co-written by star Kate Siegel (Oculus, Ouija 2), this seemingly simple plot is delivered with striking execution. In the short time we have with Maddie before her peaceful life would be so traumatized, we quickly grow fond of her. She doesn’t seem like someone living with a handicap, but rather fundamentally a regular person with a regular life who happens to lack the ability to hear.

Moreover, Maddie is far from the helpless final girl fumbling and whimpering about. She is a capable survivor and, as such, our stalker finds that he is in for a challenge.

It took me a while to realize that Kate Siegel was carrying no audible dialogue at all for half the movie. Her performance was shockingly effective despite its taciturn nature and it just goes to show how powerful a good actor’s performance can be in the hands of a smart director…even without a single spoken word. Much to the contrary, our stalker played by John Gallagher carried most of the dialogue after the introductory scenes. He, too, is quite capable and unnerving opposite Siegel’s survivor. It takes two to tango but make no mistake, this is Siegel’s movie!

This film was told through a very practical and realistic lens. Maddie considers the possible outcomes of escape attempts and concludes they just won’t work. Her adversary is bigger and faster than she is, he will eventually get inside, and there is no help nearby. So what does that leave for her?

While more about the cat-and-mouse game at the start, this film has some shocking moments of abrupt brutality–among them was a devastating bone break. And among the many strengths of this film, nothing terribly unrealistic seems to transpire. Which means little opportunity for even the critical movie-goer to roll their eyes.

I very much enjoyed this film. Sure, it’s something I’ve seen (generally speaking) many times before. But it was done very well by a filmmaker and cast we can respect. Credibly tough victims are hard to find in the slasher subgenre. So you should give this one a chance.

MY CALL: A fine possession-themed horror comedy with enough good qualities to interest me in what the director does next. Featuring a great premise but shaky writing, it’s a nice little indie that explores legal consequences and support groups aimed at possession victims. MOVIES LIKE Ava’s Possessions: In terms of style, quality and merits, I’m reminded of the super low-budget Lo (2009)–which is an obscure one, I know, and pretty rough around the edges in terms of filmmaking. More appropriate dark horror comedies include The Voices (2014; darkest), Housebound (2014; pretty dark), He Never Died (2015; pretty dark) and Cooties (2015; light dark). Wanna’ get silly? Other horror comedies include Zombie Strippers (2008), Zombieland (2009), Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (2009), Piranha 3D (2010), Tucker and Dale vs Evil (2010), Final Destination 5 (2011; not exactly comedy, but occasionally hilarious), Piranha 3DD (2012), The Cabin in the Woods (2012), Smothered (2014), Zombeavers (2014), Ava’s Possessions (2015), What We Do in the Shadows (2015), The Final Girls (2015), Krampus (2015; not exactly comedy, but occasionally hilarious), Love in the Time of Monsters (2015) and Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse (2015).

Could this make-up be a nod to Beetlejuice?

Meet Ava (Louisa Krause; The Abandoned, The Babysitters). Ava has just been exorcised and awakens to the harsh reality that often goes completely unaddressed in horror movies on the topic: so what happens now? You were possessed, the spirit has been banished, but you did some things and the real world packs consequences for our actions.

There’s a most welcome dark dryness to the humor in this exorcism/possession satire and these scenes are truly precious when you think about it. Her mother (Deborah Rush; Orange is the New Black, The Box) and father (William Sadler; Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight, Bordello of Blood, episode The Man Who was Death) come visit, make sure she’s eating enough…blame her possession on her use of marijuana. Ava asks if anyone called in sick for her during her weeks long possession. No? Probably out of a job. Want support from your friends? They’re probably afraid of you. And did you try to sleep with your besty’s boyfriend while that demon was inside you?

And then we meet her wonderfully deadpan attorney JJ (Dan Fogler; Hannibal, Hellbenders), who illustrates that yes, she faces a lot of vandalism and assault charges from when she was rampaging the streets with the devil in her. It’s basically jail, or join a group a lot like AA but for possession victims: Spirit Possession Anonymous. Ava must now make amends with those she affected during her possession and take action to see that the spirit does not re-enter her. That’s the purpose of Spirit Possession Anonymous. Besides, even The Last Exorcism (2010) had a sequel–aptly named The Last Exorcism 2 (2013). SMH

Another nice nod to Beetlejuice here.

Written and directed by relative newcomer Jordan Galland (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Undead), this very low budget horror comedy comes with a healthy share of style. The staging and heavy-contrast colored lighting of some scenes smacks of a hybrid between a Broadway horror play and an episode of Tales from the Crypt. And like both, this film was clearly produced on a low budget…but it works just fine. At least for the first 30 minutes…

Yes, that’s right. The first act of this film is good. I liked the opening style, meeting the characters and being introduced to the consequences of possession and the notion of a support group designed for it. The problem was that the story quickly spun into a mystery of sorts that found no sense of synthesis. Sure, I liked seeing John Ventimiglia (The Sopranos, The Iceman), Carol Kane (Scrooged, The Princess Bride) and Alysia Reiner (Orange is the New Black), but their parts were over-filled with over-exposition delivered with uninspired dialogue. This mystery of murder and informant prostitutes started feeling like a bad episode of Silk Stalkings.

This is where I have to say it. Jordan Galland, I like you as a director but I think you need someone else penning your scripts after you dream up your story. You have cool edgy ideas, but after the premise is painted your brush was stricken with acuity-warped palsy. I loved the first 30 minutes and then got lost in the stale convolution of the next 30 minutes. I found some redemption in the end where in a whirlwind of 15 minutes all the convoluted mess was explained in fine detail–but a little late to save the film. Galland’s story is a deep one–too bad it takes 75 minutes before you realize it. Leave some breadcrumbs along the way of the plot next time.

There were enough good qualities here to leave me very interested in seeing what Galland does next. I just hope he’s not writing it alone and that someone gives him more of a budget. He made the budget work for him, but we would have benefited from better (and more frequent) gore or makeup. Overall, it’s a nice little indie!

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MY CALL: This sequel is just plain silly…like, even sillier than part 2…which was even more ludicrous than part 1. It’s stupid and funny and it knows exactly what it is. As long as you understand what you’re about to watch, you’ll probably enjoy this. MORE MOVIES LIKE Leprechaun 3: Leprechaun (1993), Leprechaun 2 (1994) and the loads of sequels taking Warwick Davis from “da hood” to outer space. But whatever you do, don’t watch Leprechaun: Origins (2014)–terrible even for a direct-to-DVD B-movie. The Wishmaster 1-4 (1997-2002) franchise follows a similar pattern of gore and humor, however a dash more dire for the most part.

The writing quality is bottom shelf as always, as we find a double amputee in a Las Vegas pawn shop selling a life size Leprechaun statue so he can “buy gas and get out of town.” Such refined exposition, isn’t it? Our desperate statue pawner warns to leave the ostentatious medallion on the statue, which of course the shop owner removes almost immediately. The punishment for which is apparently that the Leprechaun (Warwick Davis) animates, rambles in rhyming limerick, and bites off his ear and toe before scrambling off with his gold. And naturally, a single coin is left behind.

As laughable as this sounds, take note that in three years the world has witnessed as many Leprechaun movies! So if the we the people disapprove, we’re not exactly voting that opinion with our theater-going dollar. But I, and much of the horror community, continue to delight in this movie series.

With sequels, the stakes tend to get bigger with each subsequent story. Whereas part one had nothing of the sort, Leprechaun 2 (1994) boasted three wishes granted to a Leprechaun’s captor. But now in part 3, one wish per gold shilling is granted–which could mean 100 wishes!!! We now have every reason to hope the Leprechaun wins because I’m simply not comfortable with someone wielding that kind of world-dominating power. Moreover, these wishes are truly granted and not distorted as in Leprechaun 2 (1994), Wishmaster 1-4 (1997-2002) or The Monkey’s Paw (2013).

Director Brian Trenchard-Smith (Night of the Demons 2, Leprechaun 4: In Space) has taken all of the already-shaky-at-best rules of evil Leprechauns and wishes and thrown them out the window. Not only will a gold shilling grant you a wish, but when the coin changes hands each subsequent owner also gets a wish. The only constant seems to be that Leprechauns are nearly immortal.

As our protagonists, Scott (John Gatins; Witchboard 2, Pumpkinhead II) and Tammy are pretty worthless characters. But they offer up some campy comic relief.

After being bitten and exposed to the Leprechaun’s magically toxic blood, Scott seems to be afflicted with Leprechaunthropy–which consists of an insatiable appetite for potatoes and impersonating Tom Cruise from Far and Away (1992) doing his impression of the Leprechaun. Scott’s transformation into a were-Leprechaun is slow and silly, he has a magical duel, and all the while Tammy is dressed in a slutty magician’s assistant costume.

The real highlight for campy horror fans comes when Caroline Williams (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, Halloween II) wishes for beauty, then gets monkey pawed with grossly inflated boobs and butt by the Leprechaun–but it’s nothing compared to what happened in Faust (2000).

Again, nothing compared to what happened in Faust (2000). LOL

There’s that, and of course the scene that somehow combined Frankenhooker (1990) and Deadly Friend (1986).

The director of one of these fine films once suggested that each Leprechaun movie was about a different Leprechaun, which is the only sensible notion in the entire series considering that we have seen three Leprechauns meet horrible deaths in three states (South Dakota, California and Nevada) in as many years. But now with the inception of the communicable zombiechaun infection spread through bite, I’m shocked we have not yet seen a Leprechaunado or a Leprechaun Apocalypse.

All in all, this was extremely stupid but (with the right expectations) quite entertaining. Warwick Davis has been unchained and permitted to go as over-the-top as he wishes, and it’s pretty loony.

MY CALL: Vampire Hunter D (1985) and Wicked City (1987) heavily influenced this good, but not great, anime foray into contemporary dark fantasy. Still highly entertaining, though. Enjoy the spider demons, tentacles and succubi. MORE MOVIES LIKE Demon City Shinjuku: Check out Vampire Hunter D (1985) and Wicked City (1987) for more supernatural fare. Also try Bio Hunter (1995), Ninja Scroll (1993) and all manner of Tokyo Shock cinema like Tokyo Gore Police (2008) and Vampire Girl versus Frankenstein Girl (2009). however, despite the themes of psychic space vampires and cyborg zombies, Cyber City Oedo 808 (1990) struck me as a boring major disappointment.

Anime can fall flat without meaningful characters that we come to love. When we first met protagonists like Makie (Wicked City) and D (Vampire Hunter D), they had instant appeal and offered backgrounds of intrigue or mystery. Our hero of Shinjuku is Kyoya, a swordsman charged with protecting the president’s daughter and preventing Hell on Earth. I generally like him as “a good guy,” but I’m not nearly as invested or interested in him as I was the aforementioned heroes. I’m not hating here–just identifying my single negative criticism of this movie. Everything else was great.

Director Yoshiaki Kawajiri (Wicked City, Ninja Scroll, Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust) sure knows how to make an awesome contemporary dark fantasy. First, an evil swordsman opens a gate to Hell after some sort of Highlander (1986) duel with Kyoya’s father–who fights down to his last limbs like the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975). 10 years later, evil demon tentacles thrash from a bouquet of flowers and kidnap the president! That’s what the world has come to…evil thrashing tentacles abound.

The demons in this movie are pretty cool. Following in his father’s footsteps practicing the way of the sword, Kyoya must defend the president’s daughter from their attempts at her life.

Much as Wicked City (1987) had its Black World dimension, many of the monsters of Shinjuku possess gifts of interdimensional travel through shadows, teleportation or dreams.

A bit of a throwback to the lady spider demon from Wicked City (1987), one of them is a sort of spider-centaur with a giant hermit crab claw and a toothed maw on his stomach! As if this fiend wasn’t powerful enough, it teleports through the shadows. Kyoya is also pulled into an underwater dimension to battle what I can only describe as a three-eyed demonic sloth hag.

And perhaps influenced by Vampire Hunter D (1985), the mysterious Mephisto battles a constricting succubus composed of tentacles.

Throw in all manner of lashing tentacles (at one point randomly and most amusingly dismembering a stray cat) and a villain reminiscent of Vampire Hunter D‘s (1985) Count Dracula complete with white hair and telekinesis, and we have a damn good time. It may not be terribly original, but it’s highly entertaining.

I love researching movie posters. I’ve already studied Jason Statham posters and explored whether explosions on action movie posters matter.  That is why I am excited to bring you this post. Nicholas Spark’s has had an incredibly schmaltzy run throughout the last 16 years and the movie posters for his book adaptations tell a tale.

Nicholas Spark’s book adaptations have become a moneymaking machine that combine well-known actors and a whole lot of melodrama. Sparks has become a brand and when you say it is a “Nicholas Sparks film” people know exactly what to expect.  What does it mean to be a Sparks film? The movie needs beaches, mud slides, drowning, ghosts, cancer, untimely death, spunky grandparents, cute kids and some sort of lie.  A pattern is afoot and I wanted to check if there is a correlation between the movie posters and box office/critical reception.

I wrote the original post before The Longest Ride and The Choice were released and decided it needed an update. Also, news came out recently that Nicholas Sparks was shutting down his production company. The writing was on the wall but this might actually be good news for Sparks fans. Why? Well, his movies do better when he isn’t a producer. Here is the breakdown.

Average Critical Reception (according to Rotten Tomatoes) and average domestic box office (according to box office mojo) of the films he produced (Safe Haven, The Best of Me, The Longest Ride, The Choice) = 15.25% RT and $40,210,150

Average Critical Reception and average domestic box office of the films he didn’t produce (Message in a Bottle, Nights in Rodanthe, A Walk to Remember, The Notebook, Dear John, The Last Song, The Lucky One) = 30% RT and $75,769,785.

The audiences scores were roughly the same (Sparks produced = 64.75. Did not produce = 66.85) but there was a massive drop in quality in the later films. If you’ve watched all 11 of the films you will realize they are all bonkers, so any of them if done right had the chance to succeed. I actually like The Longest Ride (for a Sparks movie) and felt that is was on par with earlier Sparks films, but audiences were still sour from The Best of Me so it was doomed. The Choice never had a chance because of the watered down nature of the Sparks name.

So, if bigger studios decide to go back to the Sparks world they should consider having somebody else write the screenplay. If might work!

Here is the revised Nicholas Sparks data!

Here are the movie poster for The Best of Me. The Longest Ride and The Choice

The following post takes a look at the posters and analyzes the box office, critical reception and audience ratings. The average domestic box-office (per Box Office Mojo) is $59,448,130 and the average Rotten Tomatoes critic score is 24.6%. The thing I find most interesting is that these films are critic proof. The critic score is 24.6% but the audience score is 66% (Per RT). The average budget is $28 million and the average box office is $59 million dollars! However, things are changing and so are the movie posters.

Here is the data from the movie posters

Posters featuring cuddles: Message in a bottle, Dear John, The Choice and Walk to Remember have accrued a 24.75% RT (-.25 on average) score and 65.25% (=) Audience score. the box office average is $63,840,500 (+ $4,392,370)

When I first collected the data the posters featuring cuddles had a much higher critic and box office average. However, The Choice happened and the numbers plummeted.

The good thing according to EW is they are some of the least ridiculous of Sparks films. Walk to Remember is the least ridiculous at eight while John and Message rank six and three. Dear John was the last film to be released before Sparks took over writing the screenplays so that is why the critical and box-office scores are higher. The posters are more creative as well. The posters are expansive, intimate and most importantly no faces are grabbed. Too bad The Choice dragged the critic and box office numbers down.

Posters featuring head grabs of doom: Nights in Rodanthe, Safe Haven, The Best of Me, The Last Song, The Lucky One and The Longest Ride have accrued an 20% (-5) RT score and 64% (-2) Audience score. The average box-office score is $56,635,747 (- $2,812,383).

Sidenote: I’ve included The Longest Ride poster in with this bunch because Scott Eastwood is grabbing Britt Robertson’s hat. It isn’t extreme but it comes close.The 30% critic score and 72% audience score helped a lot. I kinda like this movie.

The Nicholas Spark’s films have taken a serious nosedive as of late. The last six films have an average 16.8% RT score and the posters basically look the same. With the exception of Nights in Rodanthe (2nd most ridiculous Sparks film and my least favorite of the 11) they’ve gotten progressively more soul-crushing (sans The Longest Ride) and Sparksesque (Safe Haven was ranked the most ridiculous).

Why are the face palm posters so critically reviled? Well, four out of six screenplays were written by Spark’s himself. The Last Song, Best of Me and Safe Haven were the three lowest RT ranked films. The only other film ranked that low was The Lucky One which collected a 20% RT score. These four films have become like the Saw, Final Destination (sans five) and Paranormal Activity movies (They built up a good name, follow a formula and have gotten progressively worse). The face palm romances follow a bonkers beat that introduce ghosts, lies and so much sap it could crush the most stalwart of fans.

Cobie Smulders in Safe Haven =  A lot of confusion.

Posters featuring the woman embracing the man’s cheek: The Notebook collected a 52% RT (+27) score and 85%(+19) Audience Score. The box-office is $111,915, 500 (+$52,467,370).

The Notebook was incredibly passionate and super bonkers (They die at the same time!) Rachel McAdam’s character is by far the most three-dimensional of Spark’s ladies (she literally fought for her character) and Ryan Gosling became a megastar overnight because of this movie. The Notebook is by far the most popular of the nine films because of the great acting, passion, and all around care spent on the script. I would rank the poster #1 on the romance scale. They look genuinely involved. If you look at the other posters the people look sorta bored.

Conclusion: The first five films attempted to take Nicholas Spark’s books and do something with them. They tried to work around the schmaltz, contrivances, syrup, mourning, melodrama and sentiment. However, eventually they gave up and gave in to Sparks. He started writing the screenplays, and now they stick to a safe formula and face palming posters.

Maybe Sparks productions shutting down might be good for future Sparks adaptations.

MY CALL: Halfway through this movie I went from regretting it to loving every sloppy minute. It borrows heavily from our favorites but knows exactly what it’s doing: delivering one of the most ambitiously disgusting indie horror films you’ve seen. Probably only for devout gorehounds. MOVIES LIKE Bite: The Fly (1986), Species (1995), Drag Me to Hell (2009), Tucker and Dale vs Evil (2010), Evil Dead (2013) and Cabin Fever (2002) boast similar elevating gore patterns–as in the further along the movie gets, the gore gets both more intense and more frequent. On the other hand, Afflicted (2013) features a similar transformation pattern with superior characters.  And for more gross insect-related horror try Blue Monkey (1987) and The Nest (1988).

(REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS

After her tropical bachelorette party, Casey (Elma Begovic; Bed of the Dead) returns with all sorts of baggage and bug bites. About to get married, she has not yet confessed that she doesn’t want children, or that she lost her engagement ring, or that she might have slept with someone while blackout drunk in Costa Rica. I guess we’re getting the moral early in this one: don’t get drunk and have adulterous sex in Central America. But what’s equally troubling is that, now home and away from the possibly parasite-infested waters, she discovers numerous sensitive red marks all over her body…and they are starting to secrete ooze…and she’s pregnant!

I had been waiting to see this movie for months–basically since a lot of reviews suggested this was one of the most disgusting movies ever. The pustules and super slimy sticky gooey ooze, the sounds they make when she pops them, the fact that she wakes up glazed in this super viscous ichor, she’s vomiting this yellowish bile–yes, it’s all pretty gross. It doesn’t hold a candle to the execution of Drag Me to Hell (2009) or the slathered slime factor of BioSlime (2010), but it’s effectively quite nasty! LOL

This misleadingly stupid poster unfortunately would misinform you into thinking this would be stupid and ultra-low budget.
Not the case at all.  Trust the other poster!

Written and directed by Chad Archibald, this movie is GROSS much as the filmfest reviews promised and gorehounds wanted. But it for me fails heavily in the storytelling, writing and (verbal) acting departments. Everything is far more over-explained or in-your-face than is necessary for us to get the point. And what is the point? Surely we didn’t watch this to count Oscar Nomination predictions while watching this–that would make for a rather sobering drinking game.

Well, this is a lot like having The Fly (1986) told through a female lens complete with a thousand-egg pregnancy. Casey gets slimier, twitchier, and goes full on Brundlefly when she projectile vomits acidic bile to melt her would-be future mother-in-law’s face off. She peels off her fingernails, pulls out her hair in clumps, becomes increasingly animalistic; step by step she is following in Seth Brundle’s footsteps paved by Jeff Goldblum and even has a Geena Davis pregnancy dream.

Where it differs from The Fly (1986) is the maternal egg chamber. Her apartment is doused with layers of pearl-sized translucent slimy eggs (actually a lot like tree frog eggs) as if someone poured buckets of them over the tables, chairs, bed and even the walls. Then there’s this web-like mesh draped across the walls and furniture as if harbingering a Species (1995) cocoon scene.

[Actual tree frog eggs.]

Before we know it Casey transforms into a bubbly, dribbling mess of mucus-like oral secretions. As a gooey special effects admirer, I’m totally forgiving the bad acting and writing at this point because this director has an eye for sloppy sickness that I like. Like papier-mache she smears her muck all over the walls, pasting egg clutches throughout the insectoid lair to all but guarantee that when she moves out she won’t see a dollar back on the lease deposit.

Not since Drag Me to Hell (2009, Alison Lohman), Halloween (2007; Danielle Harris) or Deadgirl (2008; Jenny Spain) have I seen an actress endure so much to make scenes so awesomely gore-filled or weirdly intense. Great job, Elma Begovic! That’s commitment! Not that Annette Wozniak, Denise Yuen, Lawrene Denkers and Jordan Gray didn’t have their gore-slathered moments. But damn, Elma!

We enjoy two gross sex scenes with people vomiting on each other and ruptured pustules (a la Cabin Fever), a dash of monstrous nudity, and the filthiest crusty creature lair since the host chamber in Aliens (1986). And remember the super fun “title shot” jump scares from The Cabin in the Woods (2012) and Drag Me to Hell (2009)? Yeah, there’s some of that, too. This even features the best head stomp I’ve seen since Drive (2011).

Bite (above); Aliens (below)

Halfway through this movie I went from maaaaybe regretting it (ok, really regretting it) to just plain loving every sloppy minute. It borrows heavily from our favorites and it knows exactly what it’s doing. Without dabbling in necrophilia (Necromantik), ass-to-mouth (The Human Centipede) or cannibalism (Cannibal Holocaust), this is truly a notably disgusting movie and probably worth the hype. And despite the fact that I found most of the acting and writing to be poor, I am confident that this director (Chad Archibald) has many wonderfully gross places to go and special effects teams to see.

NSFW NSFW NSFW NSFW NSFW NSFW
JUST…DON’T LOOK AT THIS IN YOUR OFFICE, OK?
NOT SAFE FOR WORK!
FAR TOO GROSS FOR YOUR WORK PLACE!

MY CALL: This “melting horror flick” was made for fans of ultra-low budget 80s horror and gore-slathered messy schlock. No nudity, but rather violent and featuring some of the worst acting the genre has to offer. So, yeah, I liked it! MOVIES LIKE Slime City: The Incredible Melting Man (1977) was among the earlier “melting horror” movies. But Street Trash (1987), Neon Maniacs (1986), The Toxic Avenger (1984) and Class of Nuke ’em High (1986) are all more in the same style as Slime City. For something more recent and far more sleazy (and “breasty”) slime horror, try BioSlime (2010). Also, if you enjoyed this Slime City (which I watched with my Shudder subscription through Amazon Prime), try to 2010 sequel Slime City Massacre!

There’s something about the dregs of indie 80s horror that breeds an uneasing atmosphere. The writing and direction is awful and the acting can be completely stale. But this manifests something of a horror-appropriate awkwardness at times, doesn’t it? Such is the case with Slime City, a film that doesn’t go easy on the weirdness gas pedal.

When we meet Alex (Craig Sabin; Naked Fear, Slime City Massacre) he is looking for a new apartment with his girlfriend in hopes that this privacy from his old roommate will break his lady’s chastity. His frustrations are apparent and he seems to be getting tired of her, but he’s quite interested in his promiscuous rocker down-the-hall neighbor who is actually played by the same actress as his girlfriend (Mary Huner; Undying Love).

Does anyone really have a neighbor like this?
She’s posing like this alone in her apartment, BTW.

Yearning for company Alex accepts a dinner invitation from an emo poet neighbor who serves green Himalayan yogurt for dinner and, somehow, Alex readily accepts a glass of some mysterious green fluid that was prepared decades ago by a purported alchemist! He is told this directly right before he decides to take a sip. Whatever bad shit happens to him, he has it coming for being stupid!

Writer/director Greg Lamberson (Killer Rack) seems to follow hard in the footsteps of such delightfully stupid, gory, smutty and brutal predecessors as Street Trash (1987), The Toxic Avenger (1984) and Class of Nuke ’em High (1986). After Alex’s weird green yogurt and beverage dinner date, he has a clothes-on sex session with the slutty girl next store and wakes up covered in some manner of perhaps sexually transmissible slime.

Excellent disguise you made with those slime-soaked gauze…
Won’t draw any attention at all!

His body is falling apart, oozing and leaking, with his skin about to slough off. Strangely, the only cure for this malady is to brutally bash in a hobo’s head with a lead pipe! Then, POOF! He’s clean, slimeless and normal again. So, evidently Alex is now a raging were-slime monster.

This is why we pay attention to expiration dates on cottage cheese!

As if taking after The Wolfman (1941) a fortune-teller gypsy warns his girlfriend of danger. Meanwhile, Alex wanders around like some hooker-soliciting mummy wrapped up in gauze, secreting mucous. He’s like an addict. He can’t stop drinking this alchemical concoction that makes him slime out, and then he must subsequently kill to appease the evil slime.

Much to my surprise, there was no nudity at all. And good for them, I guess. While there is clearly a place in cheap horror for gratuitous nudity, this flick brings enough gore to the table that the women need only disrobe to put on a clean, slime-free blouse between scenes. The real entertainment comes in the form of super gory sludgy scenes including mimicking The Thing‘s stomach mouth, a crawling brain, and an attacking headless animated body like The Reanimator (1985)…there’s a lot for gorehounds to enjoy here.

 Apparently the brain is the source of the infection. I guess it’s trying to escape.
It also sort of looks like the animated steak in Poltergeist (1982).

It turns out there’s a greater plot afoot. It involves Satan, the occult, resurrection, and all the jazz. Kinda’ dumb. But for fans of ultra-low budget 80s horror and gore-slathered messy schlock, this should entertain you.

MY CALL: This movie looks too cool to skip, but you should keep your expectations quite low despite the trailer quality. Lots of high fantasy presented in garbled CGI quality and fragmented storytelling. MOVIES LIKE Viy: Forbidden Empire: Perhaps Viy (1967), on which several scenes in this movie were based. This film reminded me of the dark fantasy found in The Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001), The Brothers Grimm (2005), Snow White and the Huntsman (2012) or the Lord of the Rings trilogy (1978, 2001-2003) or The Hobbit trilogy (1977, 2012-2014). For older dark fantasy try Legend (1985), Willow (1988), Labyrinth (1986), The Dark Crystal (1982), Wizards (1977), The Last Unicorn (1982), The Wiz (1978) or Return to Oz (1985).

There’s something odd about the tone set by this Russian fantasy film set in 1701 Europe. From its very start it frantically darts from one story idea to another, this new character to the next, this scene to that, festooned with CGI effects and transitions that smack more of a videogame than a movie. We are bombarded by this collage of scenery and characters, complete with romantic prophecy, mortal love, an inspired inventor and explorer, some sort of horned bog creature and all manner of magic in a matter of minutes. This may strike you as something that sounds cool–but the film is not nearly as cool as the trailer.

The budget is clearly not high as indicated by the non-CGI set components, and CGI is routinely used to complement the scenery. It resembled the effects of the “clip scenes” from some horror/fantasy videogame that had amazing effects a decade ago but seems to fall short in quality today. This produces mixed feelings from this reviewer. Whereas the CGI augments the sense of high fantasy, its quality leaves me fearful that this crutch may be employed to mask other shortcomings. One such shortcoming was the atrocious English dubbing, which was more irresponsibly haphazard than that found in 1970s Kung Fu Theater. Just terrible.

Our bold explorer Dzhonatan Grin (Jason Flemyng; Hanna, X-Men: First Class) sets out to make the most accurate maps the world has ever seen using his own cartography invention. But like Gulliver or Baron von Munchausen, he has his share of misadventure. He encounters witches, foolish drunk monks, superstitious villagers and zombie wolves…but that’s the “normal” stuff. After he is commissioned to map the area surrounding a lord arrested to his land for fear of some curse, the locals take a particularly strong interest in Dzhonatan (dubbed Jonathan).

While the effects quality was mediocre, the scene featuring the girl’s animated, almost hag-like possessed corpse and the animated prehensile roots was pretty cool. It made for a long action sequence. Likewise, the mass transformation scene at the dinner table was the coolest scene of the film.

As if magically fueled by the darkest of witchcraft, the men transform into demonic creatures and their entrée pirogues hatch stillborn monstrous yet diminutive fetuses into a swarm of tiny winged imps. The demons are pretty awesome, but the scene itself comes out of nowhere and would benefit from a larger budget. Enjoyable nonetheless! I particularly enjoyed seeing the perversions of their now vestigial, modified or recently detached body parts.

Then there’s the creature with the crazy eyelids and the compound eyes. As if born from the mind of Guillermo del Toro, the monsters were clearly the highlight of this film.

Unfortunately, the scenes between the special effects pelted us with fragmented story components and, again, the destitute dubbing only made things worse since there was a lot of story to tell. Not even the occasional scene with Charles Dance (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) could save this film.

An Amazon reviewer (brad1110c, to give credit) called this a “hot mess of almost…OR an interesting jumble of potential.” That’s probably a perfect assessment of these neat ideas packed into a woeful film. The neat steam punk story, fantasy theme and Transylvania setting would benefit from a Netflix series treatment, in my opinion. If you’ve seen (and probably fallen in love with) the trailer, I probably cannot dissuade you from seeing this or waiting until it can be viewed for free. Just be warned that expectations should be set low. VERY LOW.

Sadly this dull poster is very honest.  We basically just get these three talking about crime.

MY CALL: Weren’t there supposed to be martial arts in this? Bad. Just plain bad. Probably Cynthia Rothrock’s worst movie. MORE MOVIES LIKE Night Vision: Probably any other Cynthia Rothrock movie would be better than this.  Probably…but don’t hold me to that. This is the first one I’ve seen in about two decades!  LOL.  But if you’re in the mood for a proper Bad Movie Tuesday I’d have to recommend you go with Dolph Lundgren, a case of beer and your best bros.  Perhaps The Elementary Stylings of Kindergarten Cop 2 or Dolph Lundgren and the Curse of the Shark Lake.

I recently decided I wanted to watch a bunch of Cynthia Rothrock (China O’Brien, Undefeatable) movies. Well guess what? That’s surprisingly not easy to do. As it turns out just about none of her movies are affordable on Amazon to buy except for her late 90s direct-to-video stuff and similarly her older stuff is nowhere to be found on Amazon Video or Netflix.

Now before we get started I’m sure you’re asking yourself “but is this a classy movie, like for a date night, right?” You bet, bro! We have ample nudity in just the first three minutes (quite a bit in the first 20 minutes and peppered throughout, in fact), we have the biggest female action star of the era (and she loves wearing tights to show off her karate-kickin’ butt), and one of the biggest names in blaxploitation (Fred Williamson; From Dusk ’til Dawn). So yeah, you bet it’s classy!

Officer Dakota Smith (Fred Williamson) is an aging alcoholic recently demoted beat cop who has problems with authority and a tendency to draw his gun on fellow officers. Kristin O’Connor (Rothrock) is a cute rookie (although she was about 40 when the movie was made) on probation with a tendency to kick sassy cops in the face. It’s as if they were meant to be partners.

They team up to stop a murderer in a black van from kidnapping and killing his young victims, and videotaping the whole thing to leave a calling card taunting the police. As interesting as that already isn’t, I was saddened to realize that this movie really stars Fred Williamson a lot more than it does Cynthia Rothrock. We have the queen of martial arts and I only see her throw one kick in the first hour. Whereas the aging Williamson has his laughable alley fight in which he strains to awkwardly kick so high I was almost certain he pulled a hamstring and tackles a guy into a pile of empty cardboard boxes. By the way, has anyone actually ever seen a pile of empty cardboard boxes in an alley. My guess is, if you have, they were only there because someone was about to shoot an 80s-90s action scene there.

But hey, there’s some good to this flick. For instance, it’s scored like an action-themed porn movie (sometimes written and filmed like one, too) and it features a kooky dwarf. Perhaps the only aspect of the movie that isn’t awful is Robert Forster’s (Olympus Has Fallen, Jackie Brown) performance and the awkward fat guy having naughty relations. Speaking of which, there’s an awful lot of nude naughtiness going on. All told, we’re looking at about ten boobs in this movie.

Two oddly misleading posters.  To the left, it looks like we’re getting an edgy action movie featuring Shannon Tweed.  It really only features her boobs.  To the right it looks like a dark mystery.  Nothing dark or mysterious here.

So, I have to wonder, what is Cynthia Rothrock even doing here? She kicks one guy…ONE in the first hour! This is like casting Dolph Lundgren (Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning, The Expendables 2) and then not letting him break people–kind of like how Dolph Lundgren did zero punching in Shark Lake (2015).  What a waste of a giant Swede! I think the low point of the movie is when Rothrock uses about five different woodwind instrument playing innuendos for a man’s penis. Trombone, flute, sliding trombone…ouch. She must have needed the money. But alas, it gets worse. Towards the end of the movie she has a terrible fight scene (no doubt limited by the complete choreographical inability of the cast of bad guys), probably the worst of her career. It made my heart sink.

Fred: “Why are you in this movie, Cynthia?
Cynthia: “I really have no idea.  Now please stop holding your hand like your fondling invisible balls!”

At this point you might be thinking “hey, come on, it was the 90s–of course it sucks.” Well, you hold your horses, Youngblood. Jackie Brown, Con Air, Face/Off, Air Force One, Starship Troopers, The Edge, The Jackal, The Fifth Element, G. I. Jane, Tomorrow Never Dies and The Postman all came out in theaters the same year. Wow. Could you imagine being the person who picked Night Vision over any of these for a date night at the movies? LOL.

See this poster?  ALL LIES!  We see none of this, she doesn’t wear that outfit and doesn’t do that awesome vertical roundhouse kick.  ALL LIES!

Watch out for the 46 minute mark for some of the worst police work EVER. Oof! These two look like they had one completely unrehearsed, site-unseen take to get it right. They look confused and they definitely don’t know how to cover one another. Later we see that no one on set knew what a gunfight should look like or how to handle a gun. These cops don’t know how to be cops. This was perhaps worse than when Dolph was a hitman who stood in one place all the time shooting people in One in the Chamber (2012).  What a terrible hitman!  I consulted the world Dolph Lundgren bad movie expert, Mark Hofmeyer, who confirmed for me that he never moves while shooting.  Ever here of cover?  Dude needs to watch Ronin (1998).  I’d like to see Dolph’s hitman in a gunfight with these movie cops.  What a tragedy!

Probably influenced by Sliver (1993) and Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995), our voyeuristic villain always seems to know exactly what our heroes are up to, going so far as to call them just to let them know that he knows where they are. Our killer likes targeting promiscuous Catholic women who can’t keep their clothes on. Evidently the videos are then sold through “crime syndicate porn channels.” I guess we’re supposed to believe that’s a thing just because they said it.  Not since In the Name of the King 2: Two Worlds (2011) can I recall a even a Bad Movie Tuesday so poorly written.

A pretty honest poster considering all the nudity and the general lack of worthy action.

I’m especially fond of the HUGE and luxurious apartment interiors we find within drab apartment complexes and how the little notes our criminal mastermind videographer leaves hint that this movie thinks it’s playing off Seven (1995). The film seemed to think it had a lot to say about alcoholism and adultery, but none of it was very convincing. This was wholesale stupidity presented before us with a straight face.

The director (Gil Bettman) had really only ever done some TV work and a handful of unrecognizable movies. He doesn’t seem to have a clue how to direct an action movie, or a dramatic seen… or anything. And speaking of everything he did wrong, weren’t there supposed to be martial arts in this? He cast “the queen of martial arts” didn’t give her anyone with fighting experience to face? So she just hits people, and they just get hit and don’t really do anything back. Stupid….just stupid.

Watch this for a good laugh with a buzz but do not, I repeat DO NOT watch this expecting to see a Cynthia Rothrock martial arts movie. For of all the horrible things this movie is, “that” it is not.