Roadgames (1981)

Re-watch. Love this movie and love showing it to people. Showed it to my friend Carthy tonight. He thoroughly enjoyed it.

Possession (1981)

Bizarre, passionate, and vibrant. Wicked wtf ending.

The Driller Killer (1979)

Summer School (1987)

Late night re-watch in honor of Fright-Rags new "Summer School" t-shirt.

Deathdream (1974)

Re-watch:  Showing some new friends, they "liked it a lot."

The Hidden (1987)

Re-watch.  One of the benefits of moving to a new town is making new friends, though it's been a slow process.  One of the rewards though is being able to share your favorite things with new people.  This went over well.

Richard Lynch (1936-2012)

The life of character actor Richard Lynch has always interested me.  Classical trained at The Actors Studio, young Richard Lynch allegedly tripping on Acid, set his head on fire, resulting in numerous facial scars.  Where some might think this would have ended his career, it actually resulted in a new career as a reptilian villain in numerous films such as "Invasion USA," "The Sword & The Sorcerer," "Bad Dreams," "God Told Me To," and many more, including the underrated "The Baron."  He always brought a sense of class to the movies he was in, even if they didn't always warrant it.

RIP Richard Lynch

Cabin In The Woods (2012)

I'm sure you've been there before; you're thoroughly enjoying a clever movie and then the credits roll, the lights come up, and the people behind you open their big dumb mouths.  "I would of rather watched 'Spongebob," the person behind me said to his friends as "The Cabin In The Woods" ended.  Now I have nothing against our yellow spongy friend, nor do I really have anything against others opinions about art, I mean it's all subjective.  That being said though, it is daunting sometimes when someone has such an opposing viewpoint to yours when you both just experienced the exact same thing.

I don't watch a lot of modern Horror films, so to be fair I'm not exactly in-tune with what the modern Horror fan likes.  My big criticism of modern Horror is that it tends to lack any sense of fun or originality, two things "The Cabin in the Woods" has no shortage of.  Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard's satire of Horror tropes is both fun and original, but unfortunately for some, it's not very scary.  Once again, I suspect that expectations will play a big part in how much you enjoy "Cabin in the Woods."   

A Blade In The Dark (1983)

I liked this a lot, it reminded me of the kind of Horror friends would make, shot on location in a single house.  The plot concerns a musician hired to score the soundtrack for Horror movie, working in a secluded house.  He meets strange people, some of which disappear and he fears have been murdered. 

The visuals and music are top notch Giallo stuff, the women are all very attractive, and the horrible English dubbing at times results in hilarious dialogue.  Fun stuff.

Candyman (1992)

Somehow, I never saw "Candyman."  I really really liked it a lot.  Maybe it's the Phillip Glass score that makes this film seem so much smarter than the average Slasher film, or at least classier. 

Crawlspace (1986)

"You've got to have a sense of humor, it makes life much easier if you can laugh." - Dr. Karl Gunther.

Well, he's no Patch Adams, but Klaus Kinski's Dr. Gunther does have some crazy ideas. Gunter runs an apartment building exclusively for women, equipped by the good doctor (and coincidentally son of a Nazi) with secret air-duct passageways, hidden torture rooms, and booby-trap-style murder devices. In the opening scene it is revealed that Gunther has a woman held hostage in a cage. Her tongue has been removed and she resembles a Holocaust victim.


Much of the movie consists of Kinski hiding in the air-ducts and spying on his tenants. One of the early scenes that cracked me up involved Kinski spying on a young aspiring singer as she cuts holes in her bra. The music builds ominously as a man enters the room, presumably without her knowledge, and forces her onto the bed. Kinski just watches as what looks like a rape is about to occur, and then the musical changes to a sexier theme and it's revealed not to be a rape at all, but merely complicated, intesne foreplay.


Kinski's character keeps a journal of his exploits, which is somewhat fortunate for Josef Steiner, a man who is investigating Dr. Gunther over the wrongful death of Steiner's brother, and several others. Will Steiner be able to stop the evil Dr. Gunther? Well, no, but he does have one of the best death scenes. Dr. Gunther ritualistically plays Russian Roulette every night to determine if his psychopathic destruction will continue, and thus far, he's undefeated. Every time he survives he punctuates it with the refrain, "so be it."


So how is it? Overall, I liked it a lot. At only 80 minutes long, it's efficient and effective. The last 20 minutes is especially good, escalating the tension with shock after shock (and swastika after swastika). By the time we reach the point where Klaus Kinski is gliding through the air-ducts on a trolley, full insanity has set in.


"Crawlspace" is directed by David Schmoeller, who also made the underrated "Tourist Trap." One last stray observation: Talia Balsam, who is the main victim (I guess that how you could describe her) in "Crawlspace" kind of reminded me of a female version of Jarvis Cocker for some reason, I think perhaps the hair or teeth?

--Popkoff

High Tension (2003)

Well, I waited nearly 10 years to watch this and boy was it not worth it. I remember watching the trailer, which nicely used Sonic Youth's cover of "Superstar, and thinking that this could be something different. Of course, I heard a lot about the twist ending over the years and how some felt it ruined the movie and others furiously defended it, but I tried not think about what the twist could be (even though it seemed so obvious).

At the end of the day, I think the twist ruined the movie, but not because "it didn't make sense," although it didn't. I thought it ruined the movie because it made the audience unable to sympathize with main character because the twist required that she never ever actually try to defend the others in harms way. So as a result I spent most of the movie wanting her to do something that the "twist ending" couldn't allow.



--Popkoff

"The Haunting" (1963)

"The House...it's alive."

Julie Harris stars as Nell Lance, a troubled, sheltered woman, who takes the sudden invitation to take part in a paranormal "experiment" as an opportunity to escape from her family and her past. The experiment takes place in the supposedly haunted Hill House, and is essentially just a prolonged slumber party involving folks with a paranormal past or a vested interest in the house. The house itself is an incredible achievement in set design and one of the movie's most valued assets.



Harris' performance is very good, and her character's internal narration provides some of the film's most surreal and creepy moments. Her inner dialogue contributes to the film's atmosphere as much as the music, sound design, and cinematography, even in seemingly non-threatening scenes like this one early on of Nell anxiously driving to the house.



The movie opens with a tone-setting narration recounting the history of the Hill House and quickly establishes it's ominous powers. The opening narration plays like a collection of campfire ghost stories, detailing the house's long history of death. One of the most effective sequences in this portion is the aging transformation of life-time Hill House resident, Abagail Crane.





After receiving what he believes is an incredible opportunity, Dr. John Markway invites Nell, Theo (a psychic), and Luke(the house's new owner) to spend a few weeks at the Hill House to chronicle what they experience. After a few days of unexplained phenomenon, Nell's past comes out and she slowly begins to slip into madness. At which point, Dr. Markway's non-believing wife, Grace, arrives to take part in experiment, in spite of her husband's wishes.



The final act of the film is very taunt and it's a credit to the craftsmanship of it that nearly 50 years later, the film is still very suspenseful. The "haunting" sequences themselves have a somewhat hyperkinetic feel to them, yet are very focused in their execution. The final sequence is perfectly set in the darkness of the pathway leading up to the house. It reminded me of something that I think about whenever I'm driving in the middle of nowhere. I always think to myself that the only thing scarier than being alone in the darkness is seeing someone else.



--Popkoff

Slithis...Returns

The first post I ever made on this blog was about the 1978 shlock horror film "Spawn of the Slithis." I still think of this movie to this day, it is just such an absurd, weird piece of trash cinema. It's really really funny and charming in its own way. Anyway, the whole movie is on youtube so I thought it would be nice to post it here.

If you want to recreate the what it was like to see this movie at drive-in in the late 70's, check out the "SLITHIS SURVIVAL GUIDE."







--Popkoff

Deadly Friend (1986)

First movie of 2012 (for some reason). I remember seeing this on television when I was a kid and of course, the basketball scene has haunted me ever since. Wes Craven's "Deadly Friend" is about Paul, a new kid in town and his home made robot, BB.



Paul & BB quickly make friends with Samantha (Kristy Swanson), a cute next door neighbor who has a violent and controlling father. They also quickly make an enemy in Elvira, a crazy neighborhood old woman (Ann Ramsey from "Goonies" & "Throw Mama From the Train").



The first half of the movie was pretty fun, especially the silliness that is Bebe, the robot. The scares are pretty good as well, especially Sam's nightmare about her father's bedroom invasion. Overall the acting was pretty over the top throughout, which wasn't really that bad until the second half required the actors to be taken seriously.



When Sam's father accidentally kills her while roughing her up, Paul can't bare the idea of her dying. He steals her body from the hospital and performs "experimental" surgery on her, implanting BB's "brain" into her's. He creates a Frankenstein-style version Kristy Swanson, I mean Sam, which results in the wild and violent deaths of all of the villains in the film, including yes, the infamous "basketball scene," which was much sillier than I remembered.



The "Silly-Meter" is off the charts in the second half of the film and you just can't take any of it seriously anymore. The ending in particular really comes out of left-field, but really it doesn't matter. Overall, "Deadly Friend" is pretty average, but it does have some fun sequences here and there, and even a couple moments of sweetness.



--Popkoff

Nightwarning (1983) a.k.a. Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker

Still not available on DVD (although Code Red was rumored to be putting out years ago), this under-seen and under-appreciated Horror flick boasts one of the all time best (and creepily realistic) psychotic performances by the great Susan Tyrrell. The opening scene is a knockout, and the film is filled with fun goofiness (Bill Paxton as "the Bully"), especially from Bo Svenson's homophobic cop, but it's the constant ratcheting-up of craziness by Tyrrell that really drives the Horror home. This one is a stone cold classic.

Check out the FULL MOVIE below.

Splatter Farm (1987)

It was a little over a year ago now that Lars upped the ante on the Weird Wednesday & Terror Thursday series by unleashing “Black Devil Doll from Hell” on to an unsuspecting audience. I say that because I remember thinking after that experience that the gateway of possibilities had officially been opened. There was no longer an unwritten rule that maintained that only “legitimate” movies would be screened. Weekly audiences were now no longer safe from the results of full-blown incompetent amateurs shooting movies on VHS camcorders and editing them with VCR's. The door was opened and homemade movies found an audience that they were never meant to find, a theater going audience.

The “Black Devil Doll” crowd had their brains melted that night by the sheer uncomfortableness of it all. It was like the entire theater was being forced to watch their parents have sex while listening to brutally loud Casio tones. Though only a mere 70 minutes long, the film seemed to make time grind to a slow-motion halt with every thrust and smoky exhale from that dreaded Devil Doll. To put it another way, it was legitimately awesome.

This past January, Zack over at Terror Thursday followed up the triumphant “Devil Doll” screening with Chester Turner's second and final film, “Tales from the Quadead Zone.” Again shot on VHS, it proved to be an even more odd experience than “Devil Doll,” because it allowed the objective audience member to actually pinpoint the improvements Turner made as a filmmaker. While still completely amateurish, you could see how in it's own way, it was a vastly different level of movie-making.

All of this brings us to the recent Terror Thursday presentation of “Splatter Farm.” The 1987 shock-a-thon is truly a testament to the human spirit, of both the filmmaker's and the audience. Two twin teenage brothers, Mark and John Polina (for whom this screening was a memorial for), play Alan and Joseph. When we meet the two brothers, they are on the way to their Aunt Lacey's (Marion Costly in a performance for the ages) farm for the Summer.

When they arrive, they are greeted by Aunt Lacey and her handy man/son, Jeremy (Todd Smith giving arguably the best performance in the movie). When not working around the farm, Jeremy kills people (and horses) and uses their corpses for sex. That's just the beginning of what "Splatter Farm" has in store those brave enough to press "play."

Alan and Joseph are pretty slow when it comes to figuring out that there's something really wrong with life on the farm, but I guess that's how the plot is perpetuated. There's an impressive visual effect (seriously) about 25-30 minute into the movie in which one of the twins suffers horrendously while trying to take a dump. Seriously, really really gross.

It's not until lonely Aunt Lacey drugs and rapes one of the boys and the other one finds some human remains in the woods that the full scope of what Jeremy's been up to is revealed, but by that time it's too late for everyone including the audience; the grand finale begins.

The ending of this movie is pretty awe-inspiring. There is "the line" and there is "stepping over the line," and then there's "erasing the line, but not before fistin' it and rubbing shit all over it's face." That's pretty much what "Splatter Farm" does, and then some. It is truly a barometer of good taste, but not in the way you would think.

A lot of the time when I watch old exploitation films I try to imagine what the people outside the frame look like. I sometimes think about the time period that film was made and what the people who made it were really like. "Splatter Farm" is all of the things that I've said, but it is also a time capsule. The people in it weren't designed to look like they lived in 1987, they lived in 1987! This is where they lived and this was how they spent their time. They were friends and family, and in a strange way, "Splatter Farm" is the coolest home movie a family could have.

Anguish (1987) with Zelda Rubenstein LIVE!!!!

HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!! THIS ONE CATAPULTS INTO MY ALL-TIME TOP 10 THEATER-GOING EXPERIENCES WITH EASE.

I seriously don't know where to begin with this Terror Thursday classic. It was the second part of a double-feature of Zelda Rubenstein movies, the first part being "Teen Witch." I was at the "Teen Witch" screening, but since I fell asleep during it, I chose not to review it.

I had no idea what "Anguish" was about when I walked into the theater that night, and I'm so glad that I got to experience it completely cold. I'm even more pleased though that I got to view it in pretty much the best possible manner that I can think of, with maybe one exception that I won't go into right now.

Having an enthusiastic sold-out crowd fawning over the film's diminutive star, a Horror cinema legend, and one of the most adorable creatures to ever walk the earth, Zelda Rubinstein, only amplified the surrealism of not only the film, but the night as well. When Terror Thursday host, Zack Carlson, explained to the crowd that Zelda and him had taken to calling each other Big Z and Little Z, and then from somewhere in the audience Zelda's squeaky voice eked out "I love you Big Z," my heart exploded from unrivaled sweetness.

The film, made by Spanish director, Bigas Luna, opens with a scene of uncomfortable despair as John (Michael Lerner), the meek optometrist and son of Alice (Rubinstein), tries frantically to retrieve his pet bird from behind a standing closet. As we watch the bird flap it wings, wedged between the furniture and the wall, we sense that something awful is about to happen. The feeling of entrapment that the bird experiences is merely foreshadowing of what other characters in the film will feel later on, and maybe even some of the audience members in our theater.

John is a perpetually nervous and bad optometrist. He is also a severe momma's boy. When he suffers a humiliation at work from a customer that threatens to cost him his job, his "extra perceptive" mother hypnotizes him to enact revenge on the customer. His payback is brutal and stomach-churning. When it's all said and done is when the real fun begins. To say anymore would ruin the fun. I know the film has been available for 20 years, but there's got to be some magic left in the world, so I will end my synopisis here.

"Anguish" is really quite remarkable; it's a Slasher film, a Dark Comedy, a Thriller, and above all else, a movie-going-experience. In this age of home theaters and creatively lazy multiplexes, it difficult to go to movies and have significantly different experiences from week to week. Rarely does a movie offer something that's completely different from everything else, and although the central devise in "Anguish" has been reused into cliche, it's arguable that it's never been done as well as it is here. At one point in the film, the audience simultaneously marveled at a solitary shot, so simple, yet so completely uncommon, that we had no choice, but to laugh with awe.

Sometimes people will tell you a joke that they think is really clever even if it's not. "Anguish" is so clever that you never suspect that you are being told the joke.

On a side note, the most fascinating piece of information that Zelda offered about this gem was that it was that the entire production crew was made up of 5 people and that it was the best production that she had ever been apart of.

Razorback (1984)

Let's get this out of the way right now: A movie about a killer pig CAN be scary...if done right. Russell Mulcahy's wild-giant-boar-rampaging-through-the-outback-creature-feature, “Razorback.” isn't just done right, it's done perfectly, absolutely perfectly. Seeing it for the first time, on a big screen no less, I knew immediately that this was without a doubt one of the best Horror movies I'd ever seen.

From the opening sequence that begins with a loving grandfather (Bill Kerr) tucking his young grandson into bed and ends with that man's world crashing down around him in a ball of dust and flames as a giant savage runs riot through the child's bedroom, I knew that this was no ordinary pig movie. The epic scope of the cinematography (helmed by Dean Semler) in this sequence made my legs tense up with excitement as I watched the grandfather, Jake, stumble away from his burning house and collapse in distress over the brutal death of his grandson.

As the plot unfolds, Jake is brought to trial for the death of his grandson because no one believes his story that a giant pig stormed through the house and snatched the child up. Jake is acquitted though during the trial, due to lack of evidence, but his reputation is sullied, and he becomes hellbent on revenge against the beast that tore down his life.

Meanwhile, an animal rights activist and America television reporter, Beth Winters, travels to Australia to investigate and conduct interviews about kangaroo poaching. Naturally, she is met with hostility from the locals, especially from two ruffians, Benny and Dicko, whose entire demeanor is equal parts inbred-post-apocalyptic-hillbilly & New-Wave-chic. They are ugly folks who have nothing but ugliness on their minds. After an unfortunate run in with Benny and Dicko in the middle of nowhere, Beth escapes sexual assault, but ironically doesn't escape the wrath of the giant boar.

Beth's death is considered to be a freak accident by the locals, but when her husband, Carl, arrives in town, it becomes apparent real fast that he suspects something else caused her death. Can Carl, a stranger in a strange land, find out the truth about his wife's death? Will Jake get his revenge against the beast? Will Benny and Dicko get what's coming to them? And what is the deal with that beautiful girl in the middle of nowhere that tracks boars all day for no reason? These are all questions I let the film answer for you.

For my money, there is just no shortage of things to like about this movie. The creature design by Bob McCarron (“Dead Alive”) is unique and effective. The hyperkinetic cinematography is just plain breathtaking in it's eerie use of stark imagery, wide open spaces, and outrageous lighting, especially in Carl's incredible hallucinogenic dream sequence. The tension is wrought and unbearable at times, but the action is nonstop and for lack of better word, badassss. Even the performances are great, especially from Bill Kerr as Jake.

Watching this on the heels of “Dark Age” the night before, I couldn't help but compare the two in my head. This movie was in every way everything I hoped “Dark Age” would be, a balls-to-the-wall ass-kicking, monster movie.


“Razorback” screened at midnight on 9/18/08 at the Alamo Ritz and was presented by Terror Thursday as part of the Not Quite Hollywood series.