(1972)
Dir - Joy N. Houck Jr.
Overall: WOOF
Actor-turned filmmaker Joy N. Houck Jr. had a consistently not good record from behind the lens and The Brain Machine, (Gray Matter), is his stab at a scientific conspiracy movie that is as stodgy as it is "Huh?". Propelling forward with all of the nail-biting momentum of a drugged tortoise sleep-walking through molasses, this is an all too common case of bland Caucasian actors collecting a paycheck in something that they are hopeless to elevate. Ninety-eight percent of the running time is dedicated to people either standing and talking or sitting and talking, yet always talking they are. Several people without any family ties, (always a red flag), volunteer and are accepted into some kind of program about mind reading, but how the people behind such lifeless caca ever thought that anyone watching it would figure out or care about such a plot is anybody's guess. It is all down to the wretched execution. All of the poor actors give it a professional go, but some philosophical ramblings and excitable performances fall on deaf ears since this is dated, room-temperature melodrama at best and Houck Jr. just points the camera at what is happening without any sense of making it interesting to look at.
(1975)
Dir - Mikel Angel/Don Jones
Overall: MEH
While the sleazy trash dud The Love Butcher is crap cinema no matter what angle you approach it from, it at least seems to be in on the fact that it is crap. This comes down to an intentionally dopey tone that is as much oddball comedy as it is proto-slasher muck. The very premise of a guy with a split-personality who murders any woman that turns him on has obviously been done before, (cough, Psycho, cough), but it is played for camped-up silliness here with a full-throttle performance from James Lemp in the lead. He is a hunchbacked dim-witted gardener with Coke bottle glasses, a dashing blonde stud, and a foreign record salesman at different instances, mugging it every step of the way as his various disguises easily dupe whoever they need to in order for the asinine plot to move forward. Most of the other characters are interchangeable Caucasian sticks-in-the-mud, (including a dead serious Jeremiah Beecher playing a reporter who is working with/annoying the cops), but one of the victim's curmudgeon husbands only fucks her once a year and hates rock music, arising to it one morning and proclaiming "This is a hellova way to wake up. A cacophony of horse manure.". There are a handful of other such knowingly absurd moments sprinkled about, but most of it is too sloppy and moronic to laugh at.
(1978)
Dir - Brice Mack
Overall: MEH
Carrie with Snakes a.k.a. Jennifer is a bog-standard knock-off from American International Pictures and the only horror film that background animator Brice Mack ever directed. We have the psychokinetic teenage title character with a Bible-quoting parent and popular classmates who hate her guts, but despite the same plot trajectory of Stephen King's famed novel, the specifics are different. Instead of being able to manipulate any manner of objects, Jennifer here can manifest/control killer serpents due to some ooga-booga prophesy hogwash stemming from being brought up in a snake-charming religious cult. In the lead, Lisa Pelikan, (probably), intentionally looks like Piper Laurie, especially when wearing an identical nightgown with her hair all poofed-out, but we are halfway through before any of her supernatural abilities are briefly showcased. We get lots of minutes of spoiled rich girls acting like spoiled rich girls though, which is grating since their behavior is deplorable yet Mack never leans into the story's inherent camp or much cinematic pizzazz despite some soft focus gel lights and warped flashbacks. This makes for a miserable, predictable, and listless watch that only picks up some fiendish and unintentionally silly mayhem in its closing moments.
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