I
always used to think of Roger Corman as a nice old guy. He would make goofy horror thrillers in the
50s and 60s that were essentially innocuous, entertaining fun. Then more recently I started to check out
the films from his “Roger Corman Presents” series. The first couple were surprisingly gory. I thought to myself, “Well, old Roger
probably wasn’t really involved in these. Maybe the nastiness slipped by him.” But now, after seeing SAWBONES, I can saw without a shadow of a doubt:
Roger Corman is a sick, sick man.
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I love ghost stories. I eat 'em up like candy. Mostly I love the classics, the Poe's, the Stoker's, etc. But, even modern-day ones will do if they're creepy enough. Something about ghost stories can just be eerie, even if you don't believe at all in ghosts. The fright in them comes because, no matter how rational you are, a little part of you isn't sure if ghosts exist or not. That's my theory, at least. So when I rented HAUNTED, I was looking forward to getting a good scare. What I got instead was a few creepy moments, a lot of beautiful people, and ultimately a disappointing film (although 2 out of 3 ain’t bad).
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I really love plot lines that can be summed up in a line or two. “A young boy dies tragically and the parents, with the help of a strange doctor, clone their son. When the son reaches the age at which he died, he becomes…evil.” Screenwriter Mark Bomback is one of the more talented writers floating around Hollywood. If you read the trade magazines, you see his name attached to Die Hard 4, working on projects with Bruckheimer and he is just generally accepted as your under the radar go-to-guy for thrillers. Well, somewhere between the original Godsend script (which I read) and the finished product, something went terribly wrong, which in the case of this website, is terribly enjoyable!
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I must really like you people. No I’m being serious, there is some sick, warped goings on in my head that makes me endure great hardship and woeful times just so I can entertain you, the readers. This happens to be one of those times.
I had watched HOUSE OF THE DEAD early last year and I hated it. I knew I did. But since I feel I must do right by my audience I decided to watch it again with fresh eyes. I now wish I could gouge out said eyes. The story is as follows: a group of teens are going to the rave of the century on an island called “Island of the Dead”…hmmmmm…I wanted to throw my last birthday party at Disemboweled Park but I couldn’t get the permits. Anyway, they pay some wrinkly old fisherman to get them there and when they arrive the place is a massacre, it’s deserted and there are signs that terrible things have happened. So what do they do? They dance and party!!!! Yes apparently like the kids in SWING KIDS, when terrible things are afoot, you dance your troubles away.
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Basically this movie is utter exploitative garbage with no redeeming qualities and therefore you probably have no reason to read on. The thing is, the movie, in its own shoddy way, is an interesting piece of garbage (though not an enjoyable one). For any university film majors out there, read why I felt it earned the one star it got. When I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE was released in 1978, just as the feminist movement was picking up steam, its plot launched a huge controversy. Theaters were picketed and essays were written about it. Then, when people actually saw how bad the movie was, no one really cared anymore. It is understandable, however, why the plot alone would get people all riled up.
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Review contributed by panelist Psycho Alex.
Painful...
DR. MOREAU’S HOUSE OF PAIN is about as flawed as a movie can possibly be. It is enjoyable only in carefully moderated segments of viewing, and any enjoyability is derived only for two reasons: one, it’s stupid, and stupid things are funny; and two, it’s fun to imagine that, if this thing I’ve just seen is any evidence, one could take a cheap camera, a script written on napkins, a thousand bucks, and a few hours, and make a movie that good, hard-working people can pay for at Blockbuster Video.
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Weird. Weirdness. Oddness. Bizarreness. Craziness. GOTHIC is straight up an insane movie. It is based loosely on the true-life evening in which Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, Lord Byron and others got together to swap poetry and stories. Then end result from this evening is the idea for Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. But you’ll have to stretch to get that from this movie. GOTHIC is like nothing you've ever seen before. Good? Well, maybe. Bad? Not really. Enjoyable? Well, not really either.
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Posted by our guest panelist, The Babysitter.
A series of murders. A killer who then attacks the detectives investigating the murder. A dream sequence followed by a revelation: Vampires have finally decided to come out of the proverbial closet, joining a post World War II Naziesque world, where costumes are retro enough to take your mind off the terrible moth-ridden plot holes. Yes, welcome to THE BREED, one of the original rip-offs (yes, oxy moron, I know) of BLADE about vampires living among us.
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?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?! That was the response I had to SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II. I just couldn't believe at times what I was seeing on the screen, and that’s saying something. This is perhaps one of the more surreal, odd films I have seen in recent memory. I do not mean to imply that this film is an example of stylish, existential filmmaking in the French or Italian vein. No, I’m saying this film is f’ed up. Someone dropped some tabs, smoked a fat doobie, hung out at a Church Scientology, and the result is SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II. Luckily it is entertaining and weird enough to hold one's interest, albeit by a thread, throughout its 75 minutes.
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Clichés abound. Copious amounts of clichés. Clichés up to my knees. Fields of clichés. A plethora of clichés.
By now, you might be able to guess what you're going to get with SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE, an early-80s, really cheap, really bad, really funny movie. You'd expect lots of nudity and gore and, although there isn't that much of either, there's definitely enough to put this on the "most clichés in a movie list." But then again, it’s called SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE. If it weren’t just about the most clichéd movie you ever saw, you’d be pretty disappointed.
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