(1982)
Dir - J.S. Cardone
Overall: WOOF
The debut from B-movie director J.S. Cardone, The Slayer, (Nightmare Island), is an insultingly boring video nasty that deserves to be forgotten in the plethora of unimaginative slasher rehashes that were dropped seemingly every week during the early 1980s. Shot in Tybee Island near Savannah, Georgia and independently financed, the small cast do their best with such meandering material where almost the entire movie is a couple of people wandering around looking for whoever was most recently picked-off by a supernatural force of some kind. This is only broken up by arguing and crying and to add insult to hack-laden injury, Sarah Kendall's perpetually upset, premonition-having protagonist is gaslit by everyone around her into thinking that she is just being a bothersome crazy person. As unoriginal as they come, Cardone's first time behind the lens exhibits a thorough lack of momentum-building as he and co-screenwriter/producer William R. Ewing's script is bare-bones enough to allow them nowhere remotely enticing to go. One or two violent deaths, a last minute monster reveal, and a twist ending are all pathetic attempts at justifying the rest of the excruciatingly dull proceedings.
(1986)
Dir - Bob Dahlin
Overall: MEHIf anyone ever wanted to see John Carradine in a Troma movie for a couple of seconds, then Monster in the Closet has you covered. Also in on the fun are veterans Claude Akins, Henry Gibson, Stella Stevens, Predator himself Kevin Peter Hall as the monster of the title, plus a young Paul Walker and Stacy Ferguson, both in their full-length debuts. Originally released on director Bob Dahlin's forty-second birthday on Halloween in 1986, (this representing the only full-length film that he was ever behind the lens on), it is a B-movie parody of sorts from the 1950s and 60s era, focusing on a small, suburban community that gets terrorized by a guy in a ridiculous rubber suit. Military personnel want to kill it, scientists want to study it, a clergyman considers it one of god's creatures, and a mild-mannered reporter with dashing eyes who is intentionally named Clark is just trying to get a good scoop. Said indestructible monster looks like a literal piece of shit, but its grotesque, wide-mouthed appearance works for a movie that is played for chuckles instead of scares. Unfortunately though, there are some tonal issues as the presentation fails to take full advantage of its more absurd aspects and spends most of the middle act forgetting that it was supposed to be lampooning itself.
(1988)
Dir - Graham Baker
Overall: GOOD
A formulaic buddy-cop, 80s action movie except with extraterrestrials, Alien Nation mostly delivers on its premise as In the Heat of the Night meets The Outer Limits. Utilizing a spec script from Rockne S. O'Bannon, director Graham Baker creates a contemporary film noir atmosphere that sets up a crashed slave race of beings from another planet who have been assimilated into American culture as second class citizens. Many of the alien race specifics are glossed over to emphasis the routine plot line where a gruff police detective teams up with a new partner that he has little in common with in order to uncover and stop a clandestine narcotic operation, but there are enough details thrown in to make it an engaging variation of the type of film that the decade was ripe with. These include such things as the aliens getting drunk off of spoiled milk, having vulnerable, crotch-like weak spots under their arm pits, and having a battery acid reaction to sea water. James Caan is perfectly cast as the bigoted, wise-guy cop, as is Mandy Patinkin as his noble, fish-out-of-water partner, yet unfortunately Terence Stamp is not allowed to do all that much as the villainous king pin besides briefly going full-on rage monster in the finale. Stan Winston's company does solid work with the alien design, making them foreign enough to be unmistakable yet allowing for the actors to not be burdened by prosthetics.
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