reanimation

Bad Biology (2008)

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Directed by Frank Henenlotter
Produced by R.A. The Rugged Man Thorburn

So, the Night Birds were a terrific horror-movie-and surf-music-influenced punk band from New Jersey, and they had a song called – perhaps unsurprisingly, given the subject of this post – “Bad Biology,” which I eventually found out was based on an actual independent film … because I was looking into the background stories of some underground rappers, one of whom was R.A. The Rugged Man, who cowrote and produced said flick … with director Frank Henenlotter, noted maverick filmmaker of, among other triumphs, Frankenhooker. With that recipe for success as the introduction, it probably shouldn’t surprise you to find out that I greatly enjoyed this picture, which also features a number of other underground rappers and some adult-entertainment personalities alongside its amateur and semipro cast. It’s crass, vulgar, violent, bloody, and very, very amusing, especially when the dialogue sounds like a table rehearsal, or when it’s the word-salad lingo spouted by J-Zone’s drug dealer character. The plot, such as it is, concerns a sentient, drug-addicted (detachable) penis and a woman with uncontrollable urges. But believe it or not, it’s really all about the search for deeper fulfillment. (Read that however you want.)

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

Given what I related above, it was mandatory. It’s also been mentioned a time or two within The Devil’s DVD Bin.



Should You Watch This Movie?

It would make a pretty good double feature paired with X.


Highlight And Low Point

The Night Birds disbanded but I’ll keep plugging them, especially The Other Side of Darkness (earlier stuff) and Mutiny at Muscle Beach (their pinnacle). I think the neck-snap boom-bap collabos by Snowgoons led me here; they’ve featured both Thorburn and Reef The Lost Cauze (who appears in the picture).

Rating From Outer Space: B+

死霊の罠 aka Evil Dead Trap aka Shiryô no wana (1988)

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Directed by Toshiharu Ikeda
Directors Company/Japan Home Video

There’s a LOT about this Japanese flick that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense – including the title vis-à-vis the content of the picture – but maybe that’s par for the course with a quasi-supernatural mystery-haunted-house-slasher, who can say. (Synopsis: A television newsmagazine reporter traces a videotape that inexplicably includes her.) Other reviewers seem to feel it’s clearly indebted to the Giallo, but I’m not sophisticated enough to tell you if that’s just because of the cloaked killer whose identity eludes us throughout. I CAN tell you that the filmmakers didn’t seem to know how to end the proceedings, but ultimately chose poorly, and that by a certain point someone should have stepped in to do some editing. All in all, though, this was an entertaining and suspenseful production, though that latter quality may be largely due to the amount of creeping through poorly lit hallways the heroine has to endure. There’s an actual sequel, plus a third movie that appears to be mostly unrelated but was slapped with the tag for marketing purposes.


Why Did I Watch This Movie?

The title caught my eye, and the description suitably engaged.



Should You Watch This Movie?

It was just different enough from my standard fare to sustain my interest, for whatever that’s worth.


Highlight and Low Point

There’s a lengthy (and frankly tangential) rape in this film which, although not particularly explicit, doesn’t differ much in feeling from an earlier portrayal of consensual sex. The actress was a noted performer from Japanese porn – originally slated for the lead role. The “Evil Dead” part of the moniker basically doesn’t apply, though some Raimi camerawork is evident. One kill in particular reminded me of, I think, “Blood Tracks.“ (If not Saw.)

Rating From Outer Space: C+

Bloody New Year (1987)

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Directed by Norman J. Warren
Lazer Entertainments LTD/Cinema and Theatre Seating LTD.

Felicitously enough, this wannabe fright flick was directed by the same guy who lensed Satan’s Slave and Prey, among other questionable ventures – such as Terror, which I didn’t even remember viewing. (I’ll say this for Mr. Warren’s output: it obviously gets MY attention.) Warren claims that this picture was doomed by its producers, who were cheap and didn’t know anything about horror, so he more or less “gave up.“ But while there are hints of something potentially interesting here – and something much more compelling should have been possible – this production is overly reliant on ridiculous reverse motion “effects” and insanely repetitive shots of barely seen figures, so place the blame where you may. The most promising theme, involving mirrors as some sort of temporal capture device, isn’t properly developed, severely undermining any attempt to make the goings-on coherent. Redundant at best, and imitative and inane at its worst.


Why Did I Watch This Movie?

I was supposed to go out, but my bicycle sustained a flat tire. This title claimed precedence, given the occasion.

 
Should You Watch This Movie?

In his somewhat exhaustive tome Nightmare Movies, British horror buff Kim Newman describes this production as a “feeble dump-bin video quickie,” which somehow doesn’t even fully encapsulate its slipshod nature. Provocative linked events that bookend the action ultimately seem only to serve as, presumably, irony. And need I even mention they fail to conform to this endeavor’s internal logic as well?


Highlight and Low Point

See above note concerning “internal logic”; there’s precious little of it. This is basically a ghost story, and the titular “bloody” apparently is only meant to confer its colloquial British meaning. Oh, and the story is set in … July.

Rating From Outer Space: D

La Dinastia Dracula aka Dracula ’87 aka La dinastía de Dracula aka Dynasty of Dracula aka Dynastie Dracula (1980)

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Directed by Alfredo B. Crevenna
Co-Director Claudia Becker
Conacite Dos

You would be excused for thinking this flick is a parody, along the lines of 1979’s Love at First Bite, but although that isn’t actually the case, I hereby invite you to go ahead and enjoy it in that light anyway. Heaven knows you may not be able to otherwise enjoy this (copyrighted 1978) telenovela version of the same old Dracula mythos, transplanted here to Mexico. This time, the Count is German, for some reason, which is not reflected in his unaccented Spanish. The FX are repetitious and hilarious, the vampires suspiciously easy to defeat, and the subtitles occasionally provide nothing other than “?????” (Thanks to whoever provided them, though!) This is one case where the remarkably poor quality of the aged, digitized VHS copy only enhances the experience. Two things are unexpectedly, if not exactly surprisingly, missing: a blaring rock soundtrack and gratuitous (or any) nudity.

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

It sounded interesting enough, and I felt as though I’d been neglecting foreign horror offerings.


Should You Watch This Movie?

If you look for information about this production, you will encounter more than one comparison to monster films featuring Paul Naschy. Make of that what you must.

Highlight and Low Point

When the vampire is in “bat” form, the bat is not only obviously extremely fake but is accompanied by loud squeaking sounds, akin to those of a pet toy. When the vampire appears before a hapless victim, it’s behind a flash of flame. When the vampire bares his fangs, which he does often – and which are also obviously extremely fake – he … growls? hisses? In addition, “holy water” in this picture provides a multitude of results when it is sprinkled on various evil entities.

Rating From Outer Space: D−

Halloween Ends (2022)

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Directed by David Gordon Green
Trancas International Films/Rough House Pictures/Universal Pictures/Miramax/Blumhouse

You remember in the remake of Friday the 13th how Jason had that underground lair? Well, Mikey Myers sorta has one of those in this idiotic picture, which additionally curries some Final Chapter/New Beginning zest. Which I guess is fitting, since this rebooted trilogy tried so hard to make “Michael” into J. Voorhees anyway. Most of Jamie Lee Curtis’s scenes are borderline unwatchable in this edition – allegedly the last of these, so we don’t have to pretend we’re interested anymore – and the voiceover narration of her (terrible) “book” is embarrassing. (Her minimal interactions with other cast members seem largely perfunctory as well.) Even for an endeavor that at best was going to be derivative and pandering, this release feels insipid, just one pat scene after another. And as usual, if you bother to think about any of it, it only gets dumber.


Why Did I Watch This Movie?

Title, date, obstinacy.

 
Should You Watch This MOvie?

The afternoon of the 31st, I listened to the Dead Kennedys album Plastic Surgery Disasters, in tribute to recently deceased drummer D.H. Peligro, because it contains the song “Halloween.” Coincidentally, a bar-party scene in this film features the two main characters dancing to that very same song.

Highlight and Low Point

I presume the (FOUR!) “writers” didn’t intend any anti-bullying message, especially given the namby-pamby transference BS they include. Reconfiguring the whole conceit of “The Shape” may be a halfway decent idea, or it just may be my transposition of their muddle. That Mike is something of an enfeebled afterthought here could be considered incisive commentary on the bogeyman-as-cipher … but isn’t played that way. The bottom line remains: no matter how thin you slice it, it’s still baloney.

Rating From Outer Space: D−

Land of the Dead (2005)

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Written and Directed by George A. Romero
A Mark Canton-Bernie Goldmann and Romero-Grunwald Production

While I enjoyed this relatively lavish Romero film, by the end it was nagging at me that what I had sat through was more or less an action movie. But then I started thinking about it, and realized that at heart, many zombie pictures basically are. This one, however, includes a ridiculous military vehicle – not to mention paramilitary forces – suitable for a Schwarzenegger flick, as well as a revenge plot against a devious criminal plutocrat. Ah, but the allegorical possibilities abound nearly 20 years after this film’s release. Masses in the cities crowded into hardscrabble Hoovervilles! The rich safely ensconced in their fortresslike tower! The undead inhabitating the vast wastelands that once were civilized! Or would those examples be parabular? Maybe Romero just had the touch of prescience.

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

Having just finished the initial “Living Dead” trilogy, and having found Day of more interesting than expected, I figured I might’s well tackle the more modern set.

Should You Watch This Movie?

Dunno … gotta watch the other two chapters before I can say. (As a standalone, I’m not sure it rates.)

Highlight and Low Point

The acting’s more convincing in this rendition, certainly as compared to the previous installment. It reminded me that John Leguizamo existed, for one thing … and also reminded me that CBS had a show called The Mentalist that I always thought looked utterly idiotic (and which ran for seven seasons). I suppose it’s intriguing that while the military theme carries over from that underground bunker in Florida, it’s now a private concern. I’d like to know more about how the other uninfected human survivors managed to last long enough to form have/have-not parallel societies.

Rating From Outer Space: C+

Cooties (2014)

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Directed by Jonathan Milott & Cary Murnion
Spectrevision/Glacier Films

I’m glad I’m not a real movie critic, because if I were I’d apparently have to be as humorless as I was when I was a music critic, and then I wouldn’t have enjoyed this terrific little picture nearly as much as I did. A (now much more) topical story of a mysterious viral outbreak, triggered by an infected meat product, that becomes a pandemic afflicting the prepubescent and turning them into merciless and ravenous killing agents, it’s as effectively targeted at teachers as Abbott Elementary, which it occasionally resembles (only with copious gore). It’s initially set in summer school, you see, and watching the transformation of foulmouthed fourth graders into zombified marauders – and the gleefully violent means to which their teachers resort to fight their way out – is … well, I guess I shouldn’t say it’s “heartwarming” if I want to keep my job, but it sure is grimly hilarious. This is some dark, dark, humor, and though it’s true, critic class, that it doesn’t breathe new life into blah blah blah, what the hell do you people want, anyway?

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

I discovered it took place in scholastic environs, and I’m a professional educator.


Should You Watch This Movie?

Well, I thought it was fun. The usual “horror comedy” caveat applies.


Highlight and Low Point

I don’t wanna get up on my soapbox again, but relying on the “Asian” character to provide martial arts flash and noticeably accented speech is an unfortunate choice – even given the rather broadly drawn stereotypes of all the other grownup characters. (Macho man-child, burnout, flaming gay guy, histrionic, milksop, etc.) Amusing use is made of ADHD meds. Located in fictional town of “Fort Chicken, Illinois.” Adeptly vulgar.

Rating From Outer Space: B+

Day of the Dead (1985)

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Written and Directed by George a. Romero
A Laurel Production

I didn’t watch it for this express purpose, but this flick has given me some good tips for becoming a doomsday prepper, which feels like a good idea as this country I live in lurches a few steps closer to becoming a full-fledged theocracy. (I also didn’t watch it explicitly to follow one “master of horror” with another, but who knows what evil lurks in the heart of men. Besides the so-called “supreme” court that has been hijacked by conservative ideologues doing the bidding of a dwindling but ever-powerful junta of allegedly “Christian” demagogues, that is.) ANYway, during the first 20 minutes or so of this picture I was dubious, and during the final 25 minutes or so I was but merely periodically amused, but somewhere in the middle I remarked to myself, “Hey, this is actually really good!” For which I must credit primarily the script and its depictions of both the growing interpersonal discord and the standoff between brain and brawn. That latter dualism being multifaceted, of course. As for the dissension in the ranks of the “good guys”? Any resemblance to actual persons or actual events is purely coincidental.

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

I’d never seen it, and it sounded like a good idea.


Should You Watch This Movie?

It feels unfortunately timely. Not as much as this, but …


Highlight and Low Point

I think this installment may answer my question about the undead’s insatiable hunger. Apparently, their only necessary organ is the brain, and as demonstrated by Dr. “Frankenstein” Logan, it retains vestigial information. So in a sense, the urge to eat is more or less a habit (or addiction, if you prefer).

We’ll just conveniently forget that they also bleed.

Rating From Outer Space: B

John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness (1987)

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Written & Directed by John Carpenter
Alive Films/Larry Franco Productions

This picture, though certainly not a “horror comedy,” definitely includes comedic elements, in addition to its absurdist dialogue. Now, I don’t mean to disparage the writing of “Martin Quatermass,” but the plot of this flick concerns Satan’s dad being a type of antimatter, manifesting his offspring as a sentient liquid, buried in a magical canister at the behest of intergalactic interloper “Jesus Christ,” with warning messages transmitted via dreams based on a hypothetical physics particle. Yea, discursions amongst the major players in this drama get a bit unwieldy. Elements – pun unintended! – of this production recur in They LIve and In the Mouth of Madness. (Allegedly, The Thing, this, and “Madness” constitute a “trilogy.”)

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

I frankly wasn’t interested in taking a gander at anything else I had pending, and this title popped up somewhere.



Should You Watch This Movie?

It’s not what one might expect from the title, I’ll give it that.


Highlight and Low Point

The script is sui generis; one could pick almost any random moment and find ponderousness. I did just that; here’s what I got:

“So what is the dream? Precognition? Previous knowledge of a future event?
  A shared vision of something that is yet to occur.”
“Caused by that thing downstairs?”
“Perhaps not!”
“A tachyon is a subatomic particle that travels faster than light.”

Donald Pleasence outdoes himself as, uh, “Priest,” getting so overwrought one might almost believe he Believes. (At the end of this affair, his lack of concern for what may have happened to anyone else is a nice touch.) The Prince’s method of transmitting his evil influence to others is peculiar – though reasonable given his limitations as, you know, a liquid – and disconcerting.

Rating From Outer Space: B

Q aka Q – The Winged Serpent (1982)

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Written, Produced and Directed by Larry Cohen
LARCO PRODUCTIONS

Though this would appear to be a straightforward picture about a monstrous winged serpent randomly attacking New Yorkers, it’s actually the tale of an Aztec death cult that has managed to revivify its god Quetzalcoatl to … randomly attack New Yorkers, apparently. With that setup, this bonkers production is patently ridiculous on one level, obviously, but it’s buttressed immensely by the contributions of David Carradine, Richard Roundtree, Michael Moriarty and others. (Moriarty’s Jimmy Quinn alone presents quite the psychological study.) With several of the winged serpent’s attacks being blatantly – and thus amusingly – similar, this green-screened stop-motion monster extravaganza even manages to throw in an undercover cop purporting to be a mime. Larry Cohen, ladies and germs.

Why Did I Watch This Movie?

A movie called “Q” about an inexplicable threat to ordinary citizens appealed to my sense of irony, or something. (Coincidentally, Moriarty is an expatriate American holding Canadian citizenship who once claimed he was starting a third party for “serious conservatives,” The Realists.)


Should you Watch This Movie?

Cohen knows how to make an entertaining film.


Highlight and Low Point

POWELL: “What I want to know is, how the hell does this tie in with the murders and the mutilations?”


SHEPARD: “Well, that’s what brought it back … awakened it from its … centuries of sleep.
This thing has been … prayed … back into existence.”

POWELL: “Right.”

Hmm, maybe it’s not an accident this flick is called “Q” after all. Do your own research, people. Six-time National League All-Star Ron “Penguin” Cey, who played the last of his 12 seasons with the L.A. Dodgers in 1982, has a small role as “Detective Hoberman.” Was this a sly
reference to longtime Village Voice film
critic J. Hoberman? DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH.

Rating From Outer Space: B+