2025 Horror Part Two

IT FEEDS
Dir - Chad Archibald
Overall: MEH

 

This latest emotionally-driven schlock fest from Canadian genre filmmaker Chad Archibald wields its contemporary horror cliches with an iron fist, undermining a story that is as derivative as the way in which it is presented.  Even the title It Feeds recalls other famous "It" movies, but Archibald's story is nowhere near as clever as a metaphor for STDs or a killer alien clown demon that hibernates for thirty years at a time.  No, what we have here is a generic, grimy, ugly demon thing that only those sensitive with psychic powers can see, unless not.  It all depends on what the plot needs to happen.  Innumerable psyche-outs, jump scares, and laughably unoriginal haunted Halloween house set design further dilute some forgettable nonsense about a mother and daughter facing their own trauma by helping others or whatever.  Films like these give the jaded movie-goer a reason to be jaded since we have seen all of the ingredients on display before, make that many times before.  It is a B-level stuff done on a competent scale, with actors giving the tripe material better than it deserve, and the production level being on par with your Blumhouse, Universal, and New Line Cinema genre fare that is routinely dished out during the early winter months of the year.  There is nothing more to expect and nothing more that it delivers, so count your blessings that it is at least less than two hours long.

 

ASH

Dir - Flying Lotus

Overall: MEH

 

It takes a special kind of forgettable sci-fi horror romp to be forgettable even before it finishes, and Ash, (the latest from composer/actor/sometimes filmmaker Flying Lotus), is just such a forgettable sci-fi horror romp.  On the plus side, it is also miles removed from Lotus' unwatchabley repugnant debut Kuso, down to every last detail.  There is a good amount of gore, but it is of the typical awful CGI variety that glossy R-rated popcorn movies utilize, meaning too digitally cartoony to even be gross.  This serves as the second writing credit from Jonni Remmler, though it may as well be AI generated since it offers up yet another mission into deep space with good looking actors trying to salvage a new world for future human adaption.  Of course some generic squid-like alien parasites attack the wise-cracking crew, followed by roughly ninety minutes of the two remaining characters lacking any and all charisma and simply delivering their rudimentary dialog in the most sterile and bored manner possible.  Action scenes are sprinkled in, but they are shot in a dizzying and claustrophobic manner that makes them as ugly as they are difficult to interpret.  Some audience members may be intrigued to see Aaron Paul with a ridiculous haircut playing a super duper serious space marine, but he comes off just as miserable on screen as we are by watching such lazy tripe that has been done an innumerable amount of times before.

 

CONTROL FREAK

Dir - Shal Ngo

Overall: MEH

 

For his sophomore full-length Control Freak, writer/director Shal Ngo takes on self-help influencer culture, Vietnamese assimilation into the West, childhood trauma, drug addiction, Chinese folklore, the fear of motherhood, and a whole lot of mental health issues.  The film is not so much messy or overstuffed as it is hindered, (as many contemporary horror films are), by lazy genre tropes and an overall familiarity to its themes that makes it easy to dismiss.  This is a shame since Ngo seems sincere in his intentions, maintaining an unhumorous tone and digging through a lot of psychological muck in his tale of facing one's demons and coming out on top.  Many a story has such an arc, and this one features Kelly Marie Tran as a Tony Robbins type guru on the rise, selling her vague platitudes about looking in the mirror and telling that disparaging voice in your head to shut the hell up.  Of course she has come to this line of work through a lifetime of emotional struggle, (her situation with her parents is as dysfunctional as it gets), and it all seems to revolve around an ancient demon that has attached itself to first her deceased mother and now her.  We get some body horror ickiness, a plethora of those horrendously obnoxious volume swells to dead silence, Tran fulfilling the stereotype of a woman under supernatural attack who no one believes, shitty CGI, and a hackneyed finale where she stands up the monster and yells at it and punches it enough to be saved.

2025 Horror Part One

COMPANION
Dir - Drew Hancock
Overall: MEH

 

The full-length debut from writer/director Drew Hancock takes the bare bones theme of emotional detachment via a warped reliance on technology and hits a stream of predicable beats, emerging in a landscape where people are less inclined to participate in self-growth or meaningful relationships with actual people more than ever.  In this sense, Companion does not re-write any metaphoric genre rules.  Instead, it picks up on ideas previously explored all the way back in Ira Levin's 1972 novel The Stepford Wives and its film adaptation three years later, where men are compelled to partner with idealized "companions" who will obey their every nuanced whim instead of thinking for themselves or forcing their other half to better their selves.  These ideas are merely updated here, with modern comedic sensibilities, shiny production aspects, and an overall R-rated popcorn presentation.  In the leads, Jack Quaid makes an agreeable scumbag and Sophie Thatcher a charming robot who runs through a gamut of emotions depending on what her programing is.  Some of the moments are funny, (mostly stemming around the chaotic way in which Quaid's moronic plan unfolds), but the film plays its trajectory too safe to be anything worth remembering once the credits roll.

 

THE WOMAN IN THE YARD

Dir - Jaume Collet-Serra

Overall: MEH

 

Utilizing a "Black List" script from newcomer Sam Stefanak, director Jaume Collet-Serra returns to the horror genre with another botched effort that only goes so far with its unsettling premise.  Judging by the title and the movie's poster, The Woman in the Yard does in fact contain a woman in a yard; a mysterious presence that arrives unexpectedly on a summer morning to creep out a recently widowed woman and her two children who are all begrudgingly taking one day at a time in an isolated farm house with no electricity or charged cell phones.  Because what horror movie is complete without stranded characters not being able to call for help?  Unfortunately, the film goes nowhere with its fetching set-up, at least nowhere that delivers on any of its skin-crawling potential.  Instead, we have yet another story about relatable people going through debilitating grief, fracturing at the seems and welcoming in malevolent forces to warrant some jump scares, CGI shadow tomfoolery, and topsy-survy depictions of psychological anguish.  Danielle Deadwyler does commendable work in the lead, but her performance deserves a movie that is not simultaneously trying to go bump in the night, (or in this case the day time), with on-the-nose themes, a muddled third act, and hackneyed genre beats.

 

THE MONKEY

Dir - Oz Perkins

Overall: MEH

 

Horror practitioner Oz Perkins takes his first crack at overt comedy with the Stephen King adaptation The Monkey, a goofy take on the 1980 straight-faced short story that originally appeared in Gallery magazine.  On the one hand, someone making a Stephen King movie that does not take itself seriously is a good thing, as production studios keep either rummaging for untapped material from the author or worse yet, just remake seminal films based upon it.  In either case, these King movies rarely play their premises for chuckles, which makes Perkins' absurd take on a wind-up toy monkey that murders random people in Final Destination ways something of a breath of fresh air, not least of all because most of the on screen death's are cartoonishly hilarious.  Unfortunately, that is the only thing that the film has going for it.  By Perkins' own admittance, he is working out some of his own life lessons, namely that actual life is hardly precious and can be taken away in cruel and arbitrary moments, (his famous dad Anthony died of AIDS and his mom was on one of the airplanes that crashed into the World Trade Centers on 9/11), but the story's lone joke about everyone dying and having to move on fails to emotionally connect.  Maybe this is because none of the characters are likeable, maybe it is because the film's relentlessly cynical attitude grows wearisome quick, maybe it is because the CGI gore looks terrible, maybe it is because jump scares need to fucking stop being a thing already, or maybe it is just the unavoidable tonal imbalance that comes with cathartically working through tragedy.

2022 Horror Part Twenty-Eight

THE DEATH OF APRIL

Dir - Ruben Rodriguez

Overall: WOOF

 

A poorly done and ultra-low budget found footage entry from prolific indie filmmaker Ruben Rodriguez, The Death of April makes top to bottom mistakes and hits most of the faulty found footage beats.  Done as a mockumentary with talking head interviews, on screen text, and scary music, it presents a scenario that grows increasingly implausible when a likeable young woman, (and we are told how likeable she is about seven thousand times by four different people), moves across the country to start her adult life as a teacher, only to become obsessed with a ghost that is doing ghost things in her apartment.  First of all, Katarina Hughes' protagonist seems to have a camera running during every second that she is at home, even before such rudimentary supernatural shenanigans start happening.  These include objects moving on their own, Hughes' entire personality changing as if possessed, her waking up to talk to disembodied voices, a seance gone awry, her brother's date arriving and having a psychic seizure attack, and other arbitrary events that lead Hughes to uncover that another woman around her age had been found murdered and also used to live where she now does.  Conclusions are drawn only because the script says so, and poor Hughes is gaslit by every other character even when clear evidence of her ordeal is presented in camera.  The film fails as an examination of mental illness since real paranormal activity is captured, the performances are uniformly weak, and all of the spooky gags are from the hackneyed grab bag.

 

PIGGY

Dir - Carlota Pereda

Overall: GOOD

 

The first solo full-length from writer/director Carlota Pereda, Piggy, (Cerdita), also serves as an expansion on her 2018 short film of the same name.  This is a relentlessly bitter watch, one that hinges its entire persona on the "bullies be bullying" trope that is found in many a tragedy, be it horror, thriller, comedy, or straight-faced drama.  Pereda's movie is almost entirely void of humor and instead stays in its miserable thriller lane, presenting us with a heavy-set and cripplingly introverted character who is bullied without end from her peers, while simultaneously being micromanaged, ignored, or also picked on at home by her mother, father, and younger brother, respectfully.  It is a hopeless situation for Laura Galán's protagonist, the actor giving one of those fearless performances that asks a lot of her, yet still only a fraction of what her character must endure on the daily.  Wisely, Pereda throws a kink into the mix, eschewing the mere Carrie comparisons in favor of something that dips its toes into torture porn and slasher motifs, yet also steers just clear of those loathsome sub-genre's gratuitous schlock and nihilism.  This offers up a disturbing scenario where the brutalized go further inward than they already are, finding comfort in monsters who handle the vengeance for them.  The film is a success for what it achieves, even if it is too wearisome to visit more than once.

 

HOUSE OF DARKNESS

Dir - Neil LaBute

Overall: MEH

 

Justin Long's typecasting as a doomed scumbag continues with House of Darkness, the latest from filmmaker Neil LaBrute.  It is a movie that wields its one-note trajectory of comeuppance for the duration of its running time, pitting Long up against Kate Bosworth and her isolated Gothic castle after a night of hitting it off at a bar, though what part of America this is where such a spacious European abode is clandestinely located is never explained.  Right from the onset, audience members need to gear-up for a relentless stream of frustrating dialog where every sentence that Long utters is twisted by the woman, (eventually women), whom he is talking to.  As a guy that was just planning to have a few drinks and maybe get lucky under the sheets, Long is toyed with from the onset, stumbling over his half-truths while being playfully smirked at, all the while soldiering on like a clueless horndog who either thinks that he is reading the room perfectly or feels that his charm can win the day regardless.  The problem is that every person watching this will see exactly where it is going, picking up on all of the clues and genre motifs, as well as the simple fact that we have seen Long in so many situations like this before.  It is either perfect casting or awful casting in this regard, but at least any woman who has had to endure some "nice guy" awkwardly trying to get in their pants may get a kick out of its inevitable and bloody conclusion.

90's American Horror Part Sixty-Seven

THE LOST PLATOON

(1990)

Dir - David A. Prior

Overall: WOOF

 

The worst kind of schlock is boring schlock, and that is the category that the B-level crud rock The Lost Platoon falls into.  One of many dopey genre movies in a career's worth of them from director/co-writer David A. Prior, the premise has the right idea at least, as it concerns a group of vampire mercenaries, (meaning vampires that are mercenaries, not mercenaries that hunt vampires), who currently find themselves in Nicaragua where an evil dictator is doing evil dictator things.  Also, a man who the undead soldiers had assisted decades ago during World War II shows up as a correspondent, trying in vain to convince people that these immortal badasses are the same ones that have been doing their shtick for over a century.  A movie cannot get by merely on its thesis though, and this is some mediocre balderdash at best.  The performances are universally awful, with gruff character actors laying on the scenery munching while embarrassing themselves as tough guy bozos, plus the action sequences are lazy enough to sleep through.  Some moments of unintentional humor creep their way in, but this is mostly just bargain bin trash that no one will remember the second that it ends.

 

BLACK MAGIC WOMAN

(1991)

Dir - Deryn Warren

Overall: MEH

 

Director Deryn Warren made three moderately cheap horror films in quick succession of each other before retiring, the last of which Black Magic Woman features both Mark Hamill in the lead and the Santana hit played over sex scenes.  Structurally, it is a bog-standard straight-to-video thriller of the erotic variety, one that never gets too violent or too kinky and easily could have run on either the USA Network or Cinemax with minimal editing.  Hamill proves that he was always a better actor than his post Star Wars career deserved, oozing a type of yuppie sleaze as a playboy art dealer who runs into conflict with Prince protégé Apollonia Kotero.  He predictably succumbs to diabolical forces when he cannot keep his member in his pants, but the script by Warren, Marc Springer, and Jerry Daly manages to subvert some expectations in its closing moments at least.  Unfortunately, the set pieces are bland and the presentation too cozy to offer up any proper menace, cruising along with its cheap keyboard score as Hamill charms potential customers, takes showers, gets steamy with the ladies, loses his shit, and falls victim to a deadly love triangle.

 

DISEMBODIED

(1998)

Dir - William Kersten

Overall: MEH

Writer/director William Kersten's only full-length Disembodied is a bizarre and low-rent piece of body horror that never achieves the type of midnight movie quirkiness that it sets out for.  Chalk it up to Kersten's inexperience from behind the lens or that of his no-name cast who stumble through some head-scratching scenes, none of which go far enough into wacky directions to leave a mark.  Reading the plot synopsis would allude to a more ridiculous viewing experience, since this seems to be a Frank Henenlotter homage, and that guy certainly makes weird movies.  A woman who seems several sandwiches short of a picnic arrives at a dingy hotel, only to be told by the gross innkeeper who looks like a shaved Hans from The 'Burbs that the only room available is down in the boiler room, which suits the woman fine since she is carrying around her brain in a portable compartment and has some kind of alien parasite growing inside of her that makes her cheeks fill up with puss spores and allows her to birth other vaginal-esque parasites from her abdomen.  More odd that all of that though is how aimless the presentation is.  Most of the scenes meander around without either advancing anything or providing much WTF chuckles, as if the film itself is suffering from the same type of brain-fog that our actually brainless main character is.

80's American Horror Part One-Hundred and Twenty-Six

THE ATTIC

(1980)

Dir - George Edwards

Overall: MEH

 

The only directorial effort from producer/screenwriter George Edwards, The Attic is an equally miserable and sensationalized bit of exploitation, dipping its toes into the psychological psycho-biddy sub-genre and only qualifying as a horror film within its final three minutes.  It is a long, despairing road to get to those minutes as we have to endure over an hour and a half of a pitch-perfect Ray Milland playing a verbally abusive and elderly asshole father for the books.  It is no wonder that his daughter, (the also pitch-perfect Carrie Snodgress), has turned into a wackadoo spinster, disassociated from healthy relationships, intimacy, and any hope of escaping her father's cruel and purposeful dependence on her.  We feel bad for Snodgress from the onset, and such unease never lets up as we witness her desperately try to break free, falling into bouts of dementia while proving to be a kind-hearted and charitable person that is willing to be there for her work friend.  She even goes as far as to buy a chimpanzee for companionship, one which Milland naturally despises.  Edwards throws minimal hints as to the final unwholesome reveal, but it comes off as more ridiculous than harrowing under such a long-winded and mostly straight-faced presentation.

 

THE ORACLE

(1985)

Dir - Roberta Findlay

Overall: WOOF

 

After nearly two-decades of making her bones exclusively in Z-grade exploitation, Roberta Findlay finally got behind the lens on an acceptably budgeted piece of exploitation for a change, the supernatural slasher-tinged The Oracle.  Make no mistake though, the quality level has not improved much since her days contributing in a usually uncredited capacity on her infamous ex-husband Michael's zero-merit sleaze films from the mid-sixties.  Roberta is carrying the torch here with a misogynistic and icky tale about some nonsense with a ceramic hand that acts as a conduit to dead people or malevolent spirits or whatever.  Simultaneously, there is a fat lady running around murdering prostitutes and the like, plus Caroline Capers Powers' protagonist spends the majority of the movie being hysterical and getting yelled at from every other character who refuses to believe anything that she says, because gaslighting women is a trope as old as time.  Arbitrary and nasty set pieces, relentless keyboard music, lousy acting, some rubber monster hands, laughably cheap gore effects, and a meandering plot all spell disaster for anyone looking for something NOT terrible to watch, but one or two embarrassingly funny moments do show up for the more forgiving of viewers.

 

THE BOY FROM HELL

(1988)

Dir - Deryn Warren

Overall: MEH

 

Credit where it is do, the mostly disastrous and annoying D-rent cheapie The Boy from Hell, (Bloodspell), at least boast a singular premise, even if it is derailed by crap production values, a monotonous plot, unlikable characters from top to bottom, and pathetic supernatural set pieces.  A troubled, soon-to-be eighteen year old arrives at a home for troubled kids, all of whom of course look as if they are portrayed by actors in their twenties.  It turns out that this zero charisma young man is either possessed or manipulated by his Satan worshiping old man who wants him to choose a bride for some kind of unholy ritual or whatever, and this sets in motion a repetitive structure where everyone yells, acts like assholes, gaslights each other, and occasionally die horrendous deaths which nobody in authority believes are being caused by the antichrist kid.  It is a mess of overacting and shoddy craftsmanship, coming off like an R-rated equivalent to a Are You Afraid of the Dark? episode where everyone gets to embarrass themselves and likely wishes that this never ended up on their resume.  Still, if you like a cheap synth score that hardly ever stops, lots of janky handheld camera work, characters who all suck, and someone calling Twink Caplan "delicious" while aggressively hitting on her, then maybe this will be worth your time.

80's Foreign Horror Part Thirty-Four

THE BLUE MAN

(1985)

Dir - George Mihalka 

Overall: MEH

 

The Blue Man, (Eternal Evil), comes from Hungarian-born Canadian filmmaker George Mihalka, and it is a soft, meandering bit of supernatural horror that never picks up any momentum.  We get several POV shots of ethereal astral projection, (including the movie's opening), as well as one or two moments where invisible forces attack people, but they are done on a cheap and ineffective scale at best and an embarrassing scale at worst.  It is a case of a conservative budget wearing itself on its sleeve where bottom-barrel effects shots and incessant keyboard music are the only things giving the movie any oomph to compensate for its lackluster story.  Said story has to do with an bitter and unlikable film director who is reduced to making commercials in order to pay the bills, all while he soul journey's outside of his body, argues with his wife, yells at his kid, and just comes off as an overall stick in the mud.  Karen Black is also on board and does her noble best as a hippy dippy magic practitioner who goes fully baddie by the finale, (revolving around two elderly people who are psychic vampires and jump into host bodies before the moment of death), but even her star power is hardly enough to save it. 

 

KAMIKAZE

(1986)

Dir - Didier Grousset

Overall: GOOD

 

Written and produced by famed French filmmaker Luc Besson, Kamikaze also serves as the directorial debut for Didier Groussett.  A police procedural in structure, it is one that is equipped with a unique and borderline ridiculous premise of a recently laid-off and disgruntled scientist deciding to make a microwave-powered death ray that is miraculously able to murder people via television waves; people who are situated in front of the camera and broadcasting live.  This is all treated matter-of-factly, yet there is also a subtle undercurrent of dark comedy, which is a good thing to help such absurdity go down easier than it otherwise would.  Michel Galabru makes for an excellent grumpy pants asshole, only to become humanized in the closing moments where he is finally confronted and comes off as someone who has simply become broken by the corporate machine, unleashing his boredom and rage with a shattered moral compass.  As the detective tasked with tracking him down, Richard Bohringer exhibits a sly and smirky charm, yet he still approaches his assignment with a determined logic in the face of a scientifically impossible scenario.  The deaths are humorous in their abrupt brutality, and Grousset maintains a flash-less tone that strips things down instead of playing things too sincere or too revved up in either direction.

 

THE SEVENTH CONTINENT

(1989)

Dir - Michael Haneke

Overall: MEH

 

Various works in Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke's oeuvre cannot be easily classified, as they routinely examine a type of exaggerated emotional detachment that is too purposely inexpressive to label in conventional terms.  His movies are certainly not melodramas, but they are also certainly not thrillers as film-goers recognize them, instead presenting a fly on the wall look at troubled and dark human behavior without any of the common movie manipulation that we are used to.  Haneke's debut full-length The Seventh Continent, (Der siebente Kontinent), arrives fully-formed as the first in an unofficial "glaciation trilogy", and it is a sobering and difficult watch of complacent deterioration and hopelessness.  A family of three go about their menial existence with little joy or any breaks from their locked-in routine, eventually becoming victims of such civilized contentment.  We are never given any clear answers to why the characters do what they do, since Haneke utilizes an approach that is void of sensationalism.  There is little dialog, no musical score, and most of the shots are static and contain trivial information, on purpose to showcase the boredom that they, (and now us), are going through.  It is a film that can be appreciated more than it can be enjoyed, but one cannot argue that it achieves its deadly serious goal to provoke and upset.

70's American Horror Part One-Hundred and Eleven

THE BRIDES WORE BLOOD

(1972)

Dir - Bob Favorite

Overall: MEH

 

Regional Florida exploitation, The Brides Wore Blood was the last of three ultra-cheapo films from co-writer/director Bob Favorite before he gave up the movie-making game.  It is also his only one in the horror camp, and it certainly goes hard with the tropes.  We have a sprawling mansion that people find a flimsy excuse to stay in overnight, a mute handicapped manservant, women who parade around scantily, some kind of birth curse, vampires, a deformed Leatherface stand-in who arrives two years before The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, nightmare sequences, suicide, a local psychic dressed like a gypsy, rituals, etc.  All of the desperate, hackneyed, and sleazy ingredients do a piss-pour job of hiding a plot that is barely there though, as the movie seems more intent on barreling through its cliches than telling any kind of engaging or even coherent story.  This is as is to be expected for such a dingy production, and sadly, the movie stagnates through all of its running time.  As anybody with some film stock and a place to shoot people doing stuff can tell you, compelling pacing sure is hard to maintain.

 

THE SEXORCIST

(1974)

Dir - Ray Dennis Steckler

Overall: WOOF

 

Not to be confused with the Italian film L’ossessa which was also released in 1974 as The Sexorcist, (amongst about seven hundred other titles), THIS The Sexorcist is one of countless American, bottom-barrel pornographic movies full of some of the most unattractive "actors" who ever breathed air.  Those poor folks.  Also known as The Sexorcist's Devil, it is an incomprehensible, ugly, and inept, yet it is also occasionally hilarious for those who can stomach the nauseating sex scenes.  Characters utter inane and repetitive dialog, a cult leader screams "I am the power!" while cumming, people get awkwardly bum-rushed and stabbed, and pathetic narration tries to give pathetically staged scenes some semblance of a pathetic plot.  The whole thing wraps up before it hits the hour mark, (so clearly the spirit of Jesus worked some miraculous magic in that regard), but one can barrel through such embarrassment much faster if you just skip ahead every time that schlubby, hairy, pimpled, and noticeably bored thespians start taking their Satanic robes off to fondle each other clumsily while the likely inebriated cinematographer points the camera at them in between cocaine bumps.  You just may need to take a shower after watching.

 

GHOSTS THAT STILL WALK

(1977)

Dir - James T. Flocker

Overall: MEH

 

Bottom-budgeted filmmaker James T. Flocker made just a handful of forgettable genre works, most of which came out in the 1970s when drive-ins and grindhouse theaters were both still a plenty and in need of disposable content.  Ghosts That Still Walk is certainly disposable, considering, (amongst other things), that its top-billed actor is the lady who hung herself in Airplane! while listening to Robert Hayes wine about his love life.  The premise here is sufficient enough, as it concerns one of those teenage dipshit boys who desperately needs a haircut as he gets kind of possessed by the spirit of a dead Native American.  There is no threat to speak of though since the worst that this spirit does is make the boy moody and stuck in a wheelchair for a little bit.  Well, the kid's grandparents also get their RV taken over by malevolent forces before a bunch of boulders magically attack them in the middle of the desert, (don't ask), but this is never linked up to anything and it appears as its own singular vignette in the first act.  Even if its random structure and aggressive lack of scares were a non issue, Flocker's horrendous sense of pacing would sink the ship all on its own since every sequence feels as if it goes on for nine hours.  The sound design is eerie though, with disembodied and whispery voices creatine a nice cacophony of malevolence that sadly is never represented convincingly anywhere else.

60's Franz Josef Gottlieb Part Two

THE CURSE OF THE HIDDEN VAULT
(1964)
Overall: MEH
 
Another Edgar Wallace krimi from director Franz Josef Gottlieb and the Rialto Film production company, The Curse of the Hidden Vault, (Die Gruft mit dem Rätselschloß), was adapted from the author's 1908 novel Angel Esquire.  As the film's title would suggest, its plot revolves around a comically booby-trapped vault whose treasure various dubious characters are desperate to get their hands on before before its owner's daughter is set to inherent the goods.  People threaten each other, point guns at each other, get captured and then escape and then get captured again, and we are witness to at least two grisly deaths.  In one, a guy gets electrocuted and stabbed before plummeting to his doom when foolishly thinking that he has cracked the vault, and in another, a different guy falls onto a piece of mill machinery that crushes him as he screams.  For anyone hoping to see some gore though, these movies were still some years away from indulging in such things, plus the structure and narrative components adhere to the tired and true shtick while keeping things in a comparatively more confined location.  Klaus Kinski collects an easy paychecks here as one of the most pointless characters that he ever portrayed, sporadically popping up for a second or two, uttering not a single word, and doing nothing of even slight significance until the finale.
 

THE SEVENTH VICTIM
(1964)
Overall: MEH
 
Shifting to the identically-tinged works of Edgar Wallace's son Bryce, The Seventh Victim, (Das siebente Opfer, The Racetrack Murders), is an adaptation of his novel Murder Is Not Enough, which was released the same year.  A Horse Called Satan would have also been an appropriate title, since the story hinges around a prized racing stallion that is in fact named Satan  Various bodies keep piling up around an upcoming race that Satan is favored to win, most if not all of the characters have deplorable attributes, there is plenty of lying and scheming, a police inspector collaborates with a guy who is posing as somebody else, and eventually the people who are the most bad get revealed and end up dead.  The plot goes everywhere as can be expected, only sparsely concerned with logic, and throwing suspicion on numerous characters who are worthy of such suspicion.  Visually though, this is one of the flashiest krimis from the time period.  Director Franz Josef Gottlieb had made a steady stream of these movies at this point, and he along with cinematographer Richard Angst, (also a krimi expert), keep the camera angles extravagant, which of course would be a tactic that craftiest Italian filmmakers would utilize in elevating giallos in the following decade.

THE PHANTOM OF SOHO

(1964)

Overall: MEH

 

A madame in a wheelchair serves as the cold-hearted baddie in another krimi collaboration between director Franz Josef Gottlieb and author Bryce Edgar Wallace, The Phantom of Soho, (Das Phantom von Soho).  These films were usually set in England, dubbed by actors with posh accents, done in a style that bridged black and white Golden Era Hollywood film noir with what would become the slasher and giallo sub-genres, and were all plotted with formulaic pulp contrivances.  With a sparkling gloved killer being hunted down by a Scotland Yard detective and his unofficial and pesky crime novelist partner, a ring of blackmail, insurance scams, prostitution, and the usual unwholesome tomfoolery is uncovered.  Keeping the plot points of these movies straight is a fool's errand since they are all equally frequented and interchangeable from one to the next, but they were also done competently enough to appreciate.  Gottlieb and cinematographer Richard Angst utilize the same snazzy techniques that they indulged in with the same year's The Seventh Victim, giving us some low angles, spinning cameras, and POV shots of the killer, the latter motif of which would be copied across the board in countless future slasher films.

60s Franz Josef Gottlieb Part One

THE CURSE OF THE YELLOW SNAKE

(1963)

Overall: MEH

 

Director Franz Josef Gottlieb's first in a series of Edgar Wallace adaptations that he would mostly yet not exclusively make for Constantin Films, The Curse of the Yellow Snake, (Der Fluch der gelben Schlange), dips its toes into the horror genre more than most.  This is due to the story, (based off of Wallace's 1926 novel The Yellow Snake), featuring an evil cult, who wear hoods, sacrifice people, perform rituals, and are hellbent on world domination.  According to legend, the coveted serpent artifact of the title will allow for anyone possessing it to win any war that they launch, so long as they do so on a specific date.  This gives the plot a race against time urgency, and it is a nice change to see naughty characters who are not just motivated by getting their mits on copious amounts of money.  There is a character who has acquired substantial debt and must turn to the wealthy cult leader for a bail out, (after he promises one of his daughters to get married off), but the narrative increasingly shifts to the Fu Manchu-tinged exploits of Swiss actor Pinkas Braun, who is supposed to be half Chinese under these circumstances.

 

THE BLACK ABBOT

(1963)

Overall: MEH

 

One of the more convoluted of Edgar Wallace stories, The Black Abbot, (Der Schwarze Abt), has a slew of shady characters, a Lord who goes cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, police inspectors of course, blackmail of course, a convict posing as a butler who is also a double agent, a woman who is in love with her fiancée's cousin, another insane person who is kept secret from some of her family, a "dead" mother who returns from the grave, a buried treasure, and two different culprits who end up masquerading as the mysterious and hooded title character.  Director/co-screenwriter Franz Josef Gottlieb stages things as if it is an old dark house mystery, turning an imposing mansion into a Gothic fortress of sinister shadows as the bodies pile up and people deliver lots of dialog to each other while investigating.  It is easy to get lost in the weeds with so much going on, as so many frequented tropes fighting each other for screen time is bound to frustrate more than enthrall.  Still, a flashy opening title sequence and seeing Klaus Kinski play the aforementioned butler who is not on the up and up, (even if his role is one of the smallest), are worth something.

THE SECRET OF THE BLACK WIDOW

(1963)

Overall: MEH

 

Shifting gears from Edgar Wallace, The Secret of the Black Widow, (Das Geheimnis der schwarzen Witwe), sees director Franz Josef Gottlieb adapting the work of another author, Louis Weinert-Wilton.  Based on the novel The Queen of the Night, it follows the same narrative and cinematic trajectory of the Wallace krimi movies, distributed this time by the lesser known International Germania Film instead of the comparative heavyweights Constantin Film.  Perhaps because of this, its contemporary setting affords no Gothic scenery, but it still barrels through a barrage of characters with questionable pasts and eyebrow raising motives, eventually leading to the only possible culprit who is still left standing.  The point of view stems from O. W. Fischer's aggressive and chauvinistic news reporter, who steps on the police department's investigation, refuses to take any of Karin Dor's "nos" for an answer, and also refuses to take any of the proceedings seriously.  Klaus Kinski is once again portraying a mysterious fellow here, but he is actually on the side of the law for a change as a Scotland Yard agent that is trying to get to the bottom of who is offing several connected people with a pistol that shoots plastic black widow poison cartridges.  We also get a title song of sorts that is sung in a nightclub scene by Belina, making her first and only film appearance of any kind.

60's Foreign Horror Part Twelve

SPOTLIGHT ON A MURDERER

(1961)

Dir - Georges Franju

Overall: MEH

 

Gothic horror in tone with some familiar motifs thrown in for good measure, Spotlight on a Murderer, (Pleins feux sur l'assassin), was French director Georges Franju's follow-up to his eventually much lauded Eyes Without a Face.  It has a more sensationalized and silly plot than its presentation would allude to, concerning a wealthy Count who has mysteriously disappeared and is presumed dead, though we witness his demise and accidental entombment from behind a mirror in the first scene.  Yet since no body has yet to be discovered, his greedy family must wait five years until receiving any of their inheritance.  An old dark house set up if ever there was one, the movie entirely takes place at the Count's castle where everyone is tasked with maintaining the sprawling abode, searching for his body, and putting on a son et lumière, (sound and light), show in the meantime to raise some funds.  None of the characters are likeable and this is on purpose, plus the film has a lackadaisical pace that is occasionally punctuated by still stretches of eerie atmosphere and tension, usually revolving around an elaborate sound and detection system that has been installed in the castle that kicks on and spooks some of the guests before they meet their doom.

 

THE MONSTER OF LONDON CITY
(1964)
Dir - Edwin Zbonek
Overall: MEH

 

Krimis be krimi-ing.  The Monster of London City, (Das Ungeheuer von London City), finds Bryce Edgar Wallace taking inspiration from Jack the Ripper, one of the umpteenth movies to do so.  To be technical, this is not set in Victorian era London, but instead modern day London where Hansjörg Felmy is performing on stage as the Ripper while a mad man is simultaneously stalking the streets and knifing away at ladies of the evening.  All fingers point to Felmy's thespian protagonist, who oozes about as much charisma here as a jar of shoe polish.  Of course he is not the actual culprit, that would be another character who does so for one of the least convincing reasons imaginable, but every plot needs to wrap itself up eventually.  We even get a Psycho-style rundown of the murderer's troubled mind, possibly because the filmmakers knew that they were working on flimsy ground.  Stylistically though, it is as competent as any other krimi from the era, with expressive camerawork from Siegfried Hold, and director Edwin Zbonek only allowing the pacing to lull at irregular intervals.  This is usually when Felmy is getting a stern talking to by his love interest's asshole uncle, or the usual monotonous scenes of Scotland Yard investigators discussing the case and asking questions while standing around.

 

ISABEL

(1968)

Dir - Paul Almond

Overall: MEH

 

The first of Canadian filmmaker Paul Almond's "metaphysical trilogy" which all starred his then wife Geneviève Bujold in the lead, Isabel is the only one that can be described as a horror movie of sorts, at least on paper.  Bujold portrays the title character; a young, pixie-esque French Canadian woman who has reluctantly returned to her seaport home upon hearing of her mother's illness, said mother dying before she arrives.  The place is littered with the ghosts of her past, though this is purely in a psychological sense since it is never even implied that such visions are tangible.  In fact, the audience is hard-pressed to even notice them, as the movie plays out almost entirely in a still and uneventful manner.  We are nevertheless able to pick up on the troubled nerves of our protagonist, and this is due to Bujold's strong performance which matches the film's tranquil tone.  The hardships that her character has faced are alluded to more than explicitly stated, but jarring, rapid-fire flashbacks and her docile decision to stick around such a traumatic place are enough to sell the inevitable moments later on when Bujold breaks down under the simmering anguish that has caught up with her.  It is too labored of a watch to consider it a success, but it works to a point as a fly-on-the-wall look into unhealed wounds.

60's Foreign Horror Part Eleven

THE MAD EXECUTIONERS
(1963)
Dir - Edwin Zbonek
Overall: MEH

 

Sex murders and a kangaroo court of hooded gentleman who have an underground lair to capture, sentence, and execute all manner of corporate scoundrel join forces for screen time in The Mad Executioners, (Der Henker von London); a film which packs a good amount of horror motifs into its otherwise bog-standard krimi framework.  This was one of several Bryce Edgar Wallace adaptions done during the 1960s that competed with the cinematic retellings of Bryce's more famed father Edgar, whose pulp novels were being brought to the screen by various studios at a hefty rate.  Tonally, it bounces around with light comic relief and grisly killings that never get visually explicit, as is common within the genre.  The hooded executioners of the title make a striking and malevolent impression though, condemning their victims before even going through their redundant sentencing rituals, throwing them into a coffin while the hapless saps scream their innocence, and then taking them somewhere to be hung by a museum piece rope that they keep managing to steal.

 

"AWATAR", CZYLI ZAMIANA DUSZ

(1964)

Dir - Janusz Majewski

Overall: MEH

 

This adaptation of the Théophile Gautier short story "Avatar" was adapted for the small screen and written and directed by Janusz Majewski, who would later go on to make the famed Polish folk horror film Lokis.  Quirky in tone, "Awatar”, czyli zamiana dusz, (Avatar or Exchange of Souls), is more of a light and fantastical melodrama than a proper work in Gothic horror, but its premise at least has an otherworldly undercurrent that may appease genre hounds.  It concerns a mysterious "doctor", (who may or may not officially be Satan), who proceeds to switch the bodies of a Count and a lowly Parisian man, the latter seeking the doctor's services to get his hands on the Count's Countess.  Even at less than an hour in length, it is a labored watch, with an elongated first act that takes its time getting to the soul switcheroo, at which point the narrative spins its wheels some more until the doctor pulls off one more mischievous trick on the humbled sap who came to him in the first place.  It can be viewed as a cautionary tale of misplaced wish fulfillment warranting some comeuppance, or just the usual lesson of not realizing the merit of one's own life until living in the shoes of another.  There have been plenty of body-swap movies over the decades, but this one is less memorable than the lot of them and has understandably lingered in obscurity.

 

CIRCUS OF FEAR

(1966)

Dir - John Llewellyn Moxey

Overall: MEH

 

A British/West German co-production, Circus of Fear, (Das Rätsel des silbernen Dreieck, Mystery of the Silver Triangle, Scotland Yard auf heißer Spur, Circus of Terror, Psycho-Circus), has a top-billed Christopher Lee, who is joined by fellow English actors Skip Martin, Suzy Kendell, Leo Genn, and Anthony Newlands, all of whom had and/or would appear in other horror-adjacent works.  Lee's role is actually supporting yet still prominent, but Klaus Kinski has an even smaller part, doing his usual krimi shtick of lurking around silently while looking unwholesome.  Speaking of krimis, this technically qualifies with it being barely adapted from Edgar Wallace's 1928 novel Again the Three Just Men, even if it is shot in color and the big top setting is miles removed from the usual hustle and bustle of a wet and shadowy London.  The plot still has pretty girls getting harassed, someone out for revenge, blackmail, coveted money, and someone posing as a person that they are not, but the body count is comparatively low, and the character with the personal vendetta is actually not out for murdering unrelated circus performers left and right.  Lee talks with a German accent and gets picked on by a little person though, so there is that.

60's Foreign Horror Part Ten - (Harald Reinl Edition)

THE WHITE SPIDER

(1963)

Overall: MEH

 

One of the rare krimi movie from Constantin Films that was not based on the works of either Edgar Wallace or his son Bryan Edgar Wallace, The White Spider, (Die weiße Spinne), is instead adapted from Louis Weinert-Wilton's novel of the same name.  The plot has many of the usual convoluted tropes though; an underground criminal racket, a guy who dons numerous disguises, a pretty lady caught up in the mix, characters with gambling debts, characters who want more money, substantial life insurance policies popping up left and right, a smart-ass male protagonist who is pushy with the ladies, said protagonist being an undercover agent, etc.  Peter Thomas' music is flashy here or there, but the movie has no visual pizazz or stand-out performances.  Several of the actors are recognizable from other works in the genre, playing mere variations of other characters competently enough, but not to a degree that makes the viewer care who in fact the "White Spider" is.  A krimi by numbers then, only devout completests need partake.

 

THE STRANGLER OF BLACKMOOR CASTLE

(1963)

Overall: MEH

 

Director Harald Reinl and author Bryan Edgar Wallace join forces on The Strangler of Blackmoor Castle, (Der Würger von Schloß Blackmoor), another wacky plotted krimi with the usual players on board.  Identical in every way to the Rialto Films' series of Edgar Wallace movies, we once again have the genre's main damsel in distress Karin Dor playing the relative of an older gentleman who has partaken of dubious activities that are coming around to bite him in the ass and get some masked bad guys after large amounts of money.  Specifically diamonds in this instance, which Dor's soon-to-be-knighted-by-the-Queen aristocrat uncle Rudolf Fernau has siphoned away over the years, only for a hooded bloke dubbed "The Strangler" to demand the loot lest he make good on his blackmail threats.  The pieces all fall into predictable place from there, and the setting is a castle with underground lairs to insure some good Gothic scenery.  We also get a roadside beheading and Dor nearly getting her eyes drilled out by yet another greedy and odious character who is after the goods, so the movies goes harder than others with its depiction of violence.

 

THE SINISTER MONK

(1965)

Overall: MEH

 

Another Edgar Wallace Rialto krimi during their peak 1960s period, The Sinister Monk, (Der unheimliche Mönch), brings the author's 1927 play The Terror to cinematic life, the forth such adaptation for the screen.  Anybody familiar with even a handful of these movies will recognize not only all of the plot points, but also practically everyone on screen acting out those plot points.  It is futile trying to keep track of how many of these stories begin with an old rich guy dying and then various people trying to get a hold of said rich guy's money, and this one runs wild with such a textbook premise.  The monk of the title is alleged to be a ghost who wanders the grounds where most of the action takes place, yet these films never indulged in actual supernatural bologna, so it is of course just a flesh and blood person dressed up like a monk.  He does have a particularly deadly way of offing his victims though, using a bullwhip with a decent sized bead at the end of it that snaps its victims necks before dragging them from wherever they were standing or sitting.  As the bodies pile up, no-good relatives threaten each other with revealing their most illegal secrets, and Karin Dor has her asshole cousin aggressively try to marry her, gets her face molded into a cast, and naturally falls in love with the handsome police inspector by the end.

60's American Horror Part Thirty-One

THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS
(1961)
Dir - Coleman Francis
Overall: WOOF

Z-grade garbage of the most infamous variety, The Beast of Yucca Flats, (Atomic Monster: The Beast of Yucca Flats), gives the Bill Rebane/Herschell Gordon Lewis abomination Monster a Go-Go! a solid run as the worst movie ever made.  Hyperbolic "praise" to be sure, but well deserving as anyone who can actually make it through all fifty-four equally confounding and torturous minutes of it can attest to.  Allegedly shot for $34,000, (how it cost even a fraction of this amount is anyone's guess), it appears to be made up of unrelated footage of a woman and her kids roaming around the desert, Tor Johnson, (in his penultimate screen performances, poor guy), also roaming around the desert, some people trying to gun him down from a helicopter, and a completely unrelated opening scene of a nude woman getting strangled.  No sound was recorded, so what little dialog there is only occurs when the actor's mouths are not showing.  Worry not though, since we get copious amounts of narration to pathetically force a plot into the proceedings that has to do with Johnson playing one of those Soviet fellows who flees to the US with military secrets before going mad from radiation.  Library-cued music plays uninterrupted throughout, dramatically punctuating random scenes where nothing dramatic is remotely happening, and well, you get the idea.  Consider yourself blessed if you ONLY get the idea and never have to actually watch it.

 

STARK FEAR

(1962)

Dir - Ned Hockman/Skip Homier

Overall: MEH

The only full-length to be directed by either Ned Hockman or Skip Homier, (the latter uncredited), Stark Fear is a regional thriller shot almost entirely in Oklahoma and allegedly financed by the locals.  Though well acted, (particularly by TV regular and minor scream queen Beverly Garland in the lead), it is more of a downtrodden melodrama than anything.  Garland's husband is an abusive and neglectful ass, which has psychologically manipulated her to the point where she remains desperately devoted to him despite a nicer guy that she also has aggressive arguments with wanting to marry her.  Oh, and she gets raped at one point.  Watching roughly ninety minutes of a lady's miserable life is far from a recommended watch, even if she does eventually stand up to her odious spouse after more knock-down disagreements with her best friend.  Still, its attempts at being a serious and unflinching look into the hardships faced by women who were still a few years away from the liberation movement picking up steam is at least admirable.

THE MUMMY AND THE CURSE OF THE JACKALS

(1969)

Dir - Oliver Drake

Overall: WOOF

Director Oliver Drake had a career spanning four decades where he almost exclusively made Westerns, sans the odd D-rent obscurity The Mummy and the Curse of the Jackals.  Set and shot in Las Vegas, it has an asinine enough premise of an archeologist telling his buddies to lock him inside of a tomb with his newly acquired mummy because reasons, only to turn into a werejackal, roam around the streets where no one notices his bestial form, and then fall under the enchanting spell of the now resurrected mummy lady who is not really a mummy but a perfectly preserved actress with a serious tan.  Why any of these things happen is hardly important, and the ultra-cheap production can do little with the ridiculous material that it has to work with.  The monster costumes are laughable, the acting is also laughable, the cinematographer appears to be intoxicated, the pacing would put even a jacked-up Robin Williams to sleep, and the only thing that the movie provides is some unintended giggles for those who do not turn it off right away.  John Carradine shows up as a scientist who acts just like a police detective though, so there is that.

60's American Horror Part Thirty

THE SADIST
(1963)
Dir - James Landis
Overall: MEH

 

Depending on one's tastes when it comes to deplorable cinematic scumbags, Archie Hall Jr.'s lead performance in writer/director James Landis' independent thriller The Sadist is either pitch-perfect or just insufferable.  Taking place entirely on a dirt back lot where three people are held captive by Hall Jr. and Marilyn Manning, the premise is almost gimmick-worthy in its simplicity.  For ninety-five minutes, Richard Alden is tasked with fixing a getaway car for the evil spree-killing couple, (inspired loosely by Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate of Terrence Malick's Badlands fame), yet he mostly just stands still while talking shit about and/or hatching an escape plan from Hall Jr., while the latter is clearly within earshot.  Instead of giving the film a mounting sense of suspense, it just makes for a tedious viewing experience where audience members may be yelling at the screen, as much for what the characters are doing as for what they are not doing.  Through it all though, unibrowed Hall Jr. talks in a horrendously obnoxious "dumb guy voice", cackling, mugging, frowning, and coming off as the most punchable-faced sociopath imaginable.  It is a lot to endure, but the film deserves credit for sticking to his bleak guns and slamming home the odiousness of its "sadist".

 

THE GHOSTS OF HANLEY HOUSE
(1968)
Dir - Louise Sherrill
Overall: MEH

 

An obscure haunted house film done on a non-existent budget, The Ghosts of Hanley House is a curious entry for a number of reasons.  This was the only written and directed  movie by actor Louise Sherrill, and it marks the final screen appearance of vaudeville performer Elsie Baker, with the rest of the small cast being unknowns.  The set-up is as formulaic as can be: two guys are discussing the existence of ghosts in a bar, one of them offers to give his car to the other if he stays in an infamous abode overnight, they agree that the skeptic friend should bring some guests along, and then noises, a seance, and a disembodied voice telling them to properly lay to rest a dead body later, indeed ghosts seem to exist.  Such plot specifics are a hodgepodge of cliches that have been in other tales of the supernatural, but they provide Sherrill's story with enough to get from one otherworldly encounter to the next.  Since there are clearly no funds to work with here, Sherrill is left to only utilize creepy sound effects and a late shot of a shoddy looking corpse, but these things do enhance a sort of low-key atmosphere.  Sadly, the acting leaves much to be desired and the pacing is not up to snuff, but it tries harder than most Z-grade genre movies, plus the fact that it was directed by a woman in such an era is noteworthy in and of itself.

 

DRACULA (THE DIRTY OLD MAN)
(1969)
Dir - William Edwards
Overall: WOOF

 

When digging through the cesspool of forgotten genre films, one is inevitably bound to come across the most horrid bits of cinema that were ever unleashed.  In 1969, the jaw-droppingly untalented writer/director/producer William Edwards made the less than Z-grade nudie flick Dracula (The Dirty Old Man), which belongs on a list of things that no one anywhere should ever watch at any time under any circumstances.  It has all of the heart-racing action of A.C. Stephens and Ed Wood's unwatchable Orgy of the Dead, except with the added bonus of cheap jazz guitar music that plays uninterrupted, as well as equally incessant ADRed dialog that sounds like two people doing goofy voices and mocking what is on the screen, except not humorously.  The results are as insufferable as it gets, featuring one scene after the other of an asshole doing a Jewish-accented vampire and another asshole who becomes a werewolf, both simply spying on women, kidnapping them, slicing open some throats, and then chaining them up so that they can molest them.  This all goes down with their rambling commentary, which is where the "jokes" are allegedly supposed to spring forth from.