80's American Horror Part Sixty-Four

BEYOND EVIL

(1980)

Dir - Herb Freed

Overall: MEH

 

Released in the slasher heyday, Beyond Evil has the look, feel, foreign/exotic location, and John Saxton of a typical low-budget, supernatural Italian B-movie, except that it is an American production from top-to-bottom.  Ohio born director/co-writer Herb Freed made a handful of such films, this one focusing on a colonial mansion in the Philippines that is haunted by a long-dead, occult practicing sorceress that decides to posses Lynda Day George.  The tanned, hairy-chested men often rock Lacoste's polo shirts while discussing business, the locals are superstitious "faith healing" believers, the soundtrack has some effectively creepy whisper/chanting going on at times, there is a silly devil statue that keeps showing up, fog and green lighting are used, etc.  While nothing is to be taken seriously and nobody involved in the proceedings would argue otherwise, the story and presentation only get the job done in an unremarkable fashion.  There are not enough absurd, over the top moments to make it unintentionally comedic, plus fans of excessive and sleazy gore and nudity will be disappointed as there is little to none of either.  It could be worse, it could be better, but is certainly is a movie.

WITCHBOARD

(1986)

Dir - Kevin Tenney
Overall: MEH

The debut from horror B-movie writer/director Kevin Tenney Witchboard spawned a couple of sequels despite its pedestrian, unimpressive presentation, though this is hardly anything new for an era ripe with straight-to-video franchises.  Conceptually, an Ouija board is always an inherently silly utensil to hinge a premise on and watching numerous scenes of characters taking themselves seriously while contacting spirits in broad daylight fails to conjure up the appropriate mood.  This is one of the 1980's least atmospheric/least frightening works in the horror genre and not just because of the aforementioned fact that nearly all of it takes place in sunny, California weather or in contemporary furnished, unassuming living rooms.  The central love-triangle story is handled respectfully, but it sure takes up a lot of screen time where audience members will be growing impatient by how cookie-cutter it all feels.  There are a couple of goofy moments that liven things up, (some intentionally and some not), but it often comes off as if it has no idea what a spooky/scary movie is supposed to look or feel like.  With ten minutes left, Tawny Kitaen does get naked in the shower, talk in a distorted voice, put on a suite, and then attack people with an axe though, still mostly all in broad daylight of course.

I, MADMAN

(1989)

Dir - Tibor Takács

Overall: MEH

Hungarian/Canadian filmmaker Tibor Takács' follow-up to The Gate features a weird, visually striking serial killer monster, as many horror films from the era also made it a point to include.  Played by visual effects artist Randall William Cook, the "guy with a fucked-up face wearing nothing but black" look of said villain in I, Madman, (Hardcover in the UK and Europe), is a cross between Max Shcreck, Darth Vader with his helmet off, various Frankenstein monsters, Robert Englund's take on The Phantom of the Opera which was released less than a month later and Sam Raimi's Darkman that dropped the following summer.  He makes a creepy presence which is of course helped by incomprehensible amounts of fog-ridden back lighting while indoors.  The script by David Chaskin is not particularly unique as it follows the typical slasher movie waiting game nonsense and the more that it goes on, the more it seems to just lazily piece itself together.  Jenny Wright, (the "Are all these your guitars?" groupie in Pink Floyd - The Wall), makes an adequate damsel in distress though and The Gate's stop-motion gargoyle things reached full-sized maturity apparently as one of them random shows up here with no proper narrative explanation.  For fans of campy, late-80s camp who are also looking for something more obscure though, this may appease.