(1986)
Dir - Stuart Gordon
Overall: GOOD
Featuring many of the same personnel as Re-Animator, (including producer Brian Yuzna and actors Jeffrey Combs and Barbara Crampton), Stuart Gordon's From Beyond is a much less comedic though still wonderfully bizarre, messy, and over the top follow-up. Once again quite loosely adapting an H.P. Lovecraft story, the film was shot in Italy to save on production costs where Gordon also took the opportunity to make the next year's Dolls. Venturing into otherworldly perceptions via a machine that enhances the pineal gland which also has the side effect of making people horny, the special effects team of John Carl Buechler and John Naulin, (who likewise worked on Re-Animator), have a field day concocting mutant worm monsters and turning Ted Sorel into an evolving, fleshy abomination. Along with all of the gross eye candy, the vibrant purple and pink colors further enhance everything visually and the movie is overall quite a triumph for 1980s practical effects work. Throw in Crampton in a dominatrix outfit and Ken Foree stabbing a giant slug monstrosity in his underwear and it is all pretty damn fun.
(1987)
Dir - Jimmy Huston
Overall: GOOD
The 1980s were ripe with almost a forth as many vampire movies as there were slasher movies, which is to say that there were a whole lot of them. Several ended up being full-fledged comedies as well which is where My Best Friend Is a Vampire comes in, a film that has come shy of establishing a cult following despite it being better than most of its kind. With the PG rating in tow, it dances around numerous adolescent sex jokes without ever becoming graphic. The same can be said about any overtly horrific blood sucker moments since in this universe, the undead are rather mild mannered folk who stock up on bottled blood without ever harming anyone. They also walk around perfectly fine in the daytime and instead of being full- blown immortals, they age a single year for every decade on earth, all representing a clever enough variation on common vampire tropes. A handful of recognizable actors are in on the fun, including Robert Sean Leonard in the lead, David Warner as a mislead Van Helsing wannabe, René Auberjonois as a benevolent, undead mentor, and even Kathy Bates for one scene.
(1989)
Dir - Chris Walas
Overall: GOOD
A somewhat troubled production that ultimately is flawed in a few respects, The Fly 2 still manages to be a slightly above average cash-grab sequel. Producers and studio heads clashed quite a bit before a single frame was shot, with four different screenwriters taking a stab at the material, plus there were casting issues concerning the lead, which also slowed things down. Special effects artist Chris Walas got behind the director chair for the first time and though no auteur the way David Cronenberg is, he still keeps up a solid pace and has a keen eye when it comes to the film's visual set pieces. In that regard, this is a much more gore-ridden experience than even the previous The Fly which proves to be a good thing as both the creature design and shots of crushed, bloody, oozing, and melting faces are quite entertaining. Eric Stoltz and Daphne Zuniga are perfectly likeable, yet nearly every other character is unnecessary villainous almost to a comical extent. The too many cooks in the kitchen element to the script shows at times as things occasionally seem rushed and predictable, yet it hits enough of the same proper beats as the first movie while steering far enough away from being a carbon copy at the same time.
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