(1973)
Dir - Bob Kelljan
Overall: GOOD
Though certainly not without its glitches, Scream Blacula Scream ends up being as strong if not perhaps even slightly superior to the film it is a sequel to. It slags a bit here or there and Pam Grier is rather wasted with very little to do as the good spirited, voodoo cult leader, but William Marshall is more solid as the undead title character and there are some actually well done creepy scenes. It is typical horror movie script laziness that vampires can in some instances become quite stealthy and strike at inhuman speeds only to barely move while staring with their mouths wide open at people successfully picking them off in others. Also, why would vampires just conveniently hide in closets just to make the audience jump at their emergence? The answer being to make the audience jump at their emergence. Still, every vampiric moment no matter how illogical in Scream Blacula Scream successfully pulls off an eerie mood. The melding of voodoo and vampires is also a beautiful match and no one can complain that the film does not supply enough adjustments to the undead mythos. The final segment involving a vampire cleansing ritual really delivers in this regard, with Marshall efficiently conveying the tortured and sympathetic nature of his once noble African Prince turned blood crazed monster.
(1973)
Dir - William A. Levey
Overall: WOOF
It may be unfair to call Blackenstein the absolute worst Frankenstein film ever made, but it is a serious contender if ever there was one. As it showcases an almost perfect amount of ineptitude, it explains a whole lot that the movie was written and produced by one Frank R. Saletri, a criminal lawyer who wanted to make it in Hollywood and thankfully failed. Joe De Sue is the worst actor, (period?), to ever play any form of Frankenstein's monster, yet to be fair, he is not an actor at all but simply a client of said movie maker/lawyer hack. Worry not though, the "acting" from top to bottom is thoroughly insufficient, as is the cinematography, editing, direction, and everything else. Also the music is all stock and usually appears randomly during the most incorrect times. Going into detail about how asinine the script is would take more paragraphs than the movie deserves, but it is as moronic as you would expect. Frankenstein monster man magically grows a Boris Karloff style suite to go along with his hair, he is moved to a cell for no reason when he is still a patient, he walks like he is blind with his arms outstretched because Frankenstein, he conveniently sleeps all day and only gets up at night because vampires too I guess, he deliberately goes out of his way to murder someone he knows first before then haphazardly killing and eating the intestines of anyone he meets after that, and bullets do nothing to him yet a couple of dogs end up biting him to death with zero difficulty. These elements are all easy to laugh at, but good lord is the movie surrounding them catastrophically boring, with minutes upon minutes of nothing more exciting happening than watching people walk/sit around to the wrong musical accompaniment.
(1976)
Dir - William Crain
Overall: MEH
Out of all the blaxploitation horror outings produced in the 70's, Dr. Black, Mr. Hyde has the most prominent racial themes present. The title character literally transforms from a generous and respected black doctor into a superhuman, white ape like brute who finds his end in a final set piece that unmistakably references King Kong. With such obvious themes, it is easy to get caught up in them while ignoring some of the just-as-noticeable problems the film has. Its pacing is dreadful and similar to many Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde interpretations, (though this one barely qualifies), it becomes very tedious to just watch the main character bounce back between his "good" and "bad" sides for about ninety-minutes until the movie determines that we have had enough and spins the credits. For his role as Dr. Pride, (Jekyll), Bernie Casey is the best part of the movie, playing the duel character as convincingly as anyone ever has. Unfortunately, his entire motivation for transforming himself is rather thin and he does some pretty morally unwholesome things even without the white-ape monster juice coursing through his veins. Yet being a textbook blaxploitation film, there are plenty of scenes of pimps and hos smacking each other around and starting shit with the cops and for the most part these attempts at humor work with some memorable dialog here and there.
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