Rock 'N' Roll Nightmare: The Edge of Hell

Watched October 13, 2015

1987
Starring: Jon-Mikl Thor, Jillian Peri, Frank Dietz

The Tritonz, a heavy metal band from the US comes to a farm house in Canada to write and record their new album. But what they don't know is that the family that lived in the house previously was attacked by some mysterious demons, and the demons may still be around.  All the band members bring their wives and girlfriends as support. The drummer has a weirdly fake Australian accent. John (Jon-Mikl Thor) the lead singer of the band and his lady take the master bedroom of the house, which has a bed made to look like a piano. 

All the bandmates settle into the house. The bands manager Phil (Adam Fried) makes them dinner then they all head to the barn to record some songs. While Phil is rocking out in the control booth to the awesome sound of The Tritonz, a cyclops demons that looks like a penis spits in his drink. Phil unknowingly drinks the demon spit and things begin to get weird. He goes down the basement to find some extra drum sticks. One of the bitchy girlfriends shows up and comes onto him. But she turns into a demon and bites him on the shoulder. 

The band leaves the barn to find the van is gone, so they think Phil took it since they can't find him either. All the couples take this opportunity to make out. Later that night a bunch of groupies come to the house.  Demon possessed Phil shows up again and tells them to show him their boobs, but they freak out and leave. The drummer guy gets demon possessed too but becomes a better lover because of it. The couples keep dying but not before the keyboardist hooks up with a guitarist and have a long drawn out gross sex scene. Then John and his woman have an equally long and gross shower sex scene. Eventually every one is presumed dead except for John. In the barn, a huge demon comes to kill John. To combat the demon, John reveals himself to be the Angel Triton and he concocted all the people and the story that we just saw to get the demon to come out. There is no band, it was all an elaborate ruse, with lots of sex scenes. John fights the demon, as the demon throws demonic starfish at him. They lock arms and try to overpower one another. In the end, John doesn't beat the demon, the demon just decides to leave the house.

There is a ton of filler footage of the van driving down highway on the way to the house. They also show the house and the moonlit night many many times, trying to get across a mood of spookiness. There are lots of boobs and super gross too long sex scenes. All the acting is really bad. All the mini demons looks like dick worms. The fight with the main demon at the end is pretty great because it's so bad. It's super terrible, but kinda fun in that regard.

American Anthem

Watched October 6, 2015

Starring: Mitch Gaylord, Janet Jones, Michael Pataki

It begins with a montage (the first of many) cutting between shots of the New York City skyline and the mountains of Flagstaff, Arizona. It's a very confusing start because we haven't been introduced to the main characters yet. Steve (Mitch Gaylord) has a job welding in a motorcycle shop and it seems like a pretty good job. Steve's dad has been out of work for a year after being laid off. and is very angry about it. Steve had a college football scholarship, along with being a very talents gymnast, but then his dad broke his arm and Steve couldn't take the scholarship.

Julie (Janet Jones) is a gymnast from New York who comes to the TOPs gym in Flagstaff to train for the upcoming competition to try out for the national gymnastics team. Even though Steve no longer is training in gymnastics, he still comes to watch some of the other gymnasts.

Steve and Julie meet and have a montage of falling in love, or something like that. At the gym, Julie is being pushed harder than she has ever been before. She happens to have a cousin, Arthur (Andrea Bianchi) who lives in Flagstaff. Arthur's main hobby is playing crazy synthesizers ever since his legs were damaged in a car accident that killed both his parents. Julie really like the songs that Arthur composes and she tries to incorporate them into her floor routine, but her coaches aren't into it.

Julie convinces Steve to come back to gymnastics. He agrees, but has a hard time juggling practice time with his job at the motorcycle shop. Plus his dad has some real rage issues.

At a practice meet, Steve tries a crazy move on the high bar and falls onto his spotter. The spotter is pushed into a table, his face broken and covered in blood.


When he's not at the gym, Steve has set up a bar in the woods between two trees that he practices on. One night, he's on his tree bar when it's raining and he falls off the bar after doing some crazy move. I'm not sure if this helps him realize that he needs to stop practicing in the woods or that he needs to focus more on his life goals.

After a falling he decides not to take the bus down with the rest of the team for the big competition in Phoenix. He comes home to his parents fighting, it seems like his dad is in a mood again. Steve tells his brother to run from the house., So his little brother gets on a trike ATV and races off. Then Steve chases him on his motorcycle. It's a very strange chase, but the little brother won't seem to stop. The brother falls off the ATV before it runs off a cliff. The brother almost falls off the cliff too but Steve gets there in time to save him. After some indecision, Steve decides to head down to Phoenix to compete after all. He runs into his mom on the way and invites her to come watch him.

Steve makes it to Phoenix in time for the competition. It's a very long meet, we see almost every character do a full routine. Julie decides after some hesitation to use her cousin's song for her floor routine and she makes the team. Steve does too. The end

There are a lot of ADR lines especially when Steven and Julie are courting. Steve broods a lot and has lots of cut shots, he doesn't seem to be in the same scenes as people. There are a lot of blue lights around making it feel like a music video. Mitch Gaylord, a great gymnast, is not an actor. I do like watching gymnastics, but this movie doesn't make it fun. It also doesn't do a good job showing why Mitch quit in the first place. Also, why did he get a football scholarship if this movie is about gymnastics.

I liked Julie's leotards.

Witchboard

Watched September 29, 2015

1986
Starring: Tawny Kitaen, Todd Allen, Stephen Nichols, Kathleen Wilhoite

Linda (Tawny Kitaen) and Jim (Todd Allen), a young couple are throwing a party at their apartment. Linda invited an old friend, Brandon (Stephen Nichols) who is not friends with Jim anymore...but it takes some time for this relationship to be explained. Brandon is talking to some of the party guests about weird ghosts, religion and acting like a jerk. He has brought a Ouija board , that he has a lot of experiencing using. He convinces Linda to try it with him and they contact a little boy named David. Brendan seems to know a lot about the Ouija board, the history of it and how to use it correctly. After asking the ghost boy David some questions the board jumps off their laps. From outside, they hear a pop and Brandon's fancy sport car has a sudden flat tire.

Since Brandon had to leave the party suddenly he left his Ouija board at Linda and Jim's place. The next day Linda uses the board to contact the ghost David and he helps her find her missing ring. That same day, Jim is at work on a construction site when his friend and coworker is flattened by a pile of Sheetrock. Jim comes home upset about the sudden death of his friend. Linda starts to act strange but it turns out she might be pregnant. Brandon talks to Linda and tells her that she shouldn't be using the board alone. Linda thinks it's harmless until she gets trapped in the kitchen and a knife is thrown to the ground and covered in cocktail sauce.

Brandon thinks that Linda is a victim of progressive entrapment, where a ghost slowly manages to gain the trust of a person until they can take her over. He hires a crazy medium to lock out David from Linda's mind. The medium, Zarabeth (Kathleen Wilhoite) is a valley girl/punk-ish nut but it seems like she does have a real connection to the spiritual realm. They hold a séance and it seems like Zarabeth kicks David out. Brandon drives Zarabeth back home, but the bad spirit follows her into her house. In her apartment it slits her throat and pushes her out the window onto sharp sundial.

Linda and Jim go to the funeral of his construction coworker. There Jim is questioned by a detective who thinks the accident was actually murder and Jim is the main suspect. The detective begins to follow Jim.

Brandon wants to go up to Big Bear where David was killed to make sure they've been talking to him and not some other ghost. Linda tries to contact David again and he shakes her around until she is knocked unconscious. Jim takes her to the hospital but then goes with Brandon to Big Bear.  They find out the David isn't lying by looking up his murder on microfiche at the library. Jim and Brandon spend time together and repair their relationship that was torn apart by Jim's love for Linda.

They get another Ouija board to contact David  to see if he can help them figure out what the actual dark spirit that is trying to progressively entrap Linda. They take it to an old dock and in front of a bunch of tied up barrels try to contact David. It turns out that David is talking to them but there is also an old Portuguese spirit that used to live in Jim's building that is trying to possess Linda. After talking to David, the barrels are unleashed. Jim is knocked unconscious and Brandon falls into the water. Dazed, Brandon does pull himself out of the water but then is killed by an ax to the face. Jim later wakes up, stumbles around and finds Brandon dead.

Jim heads back to the apartment and it's all torn to shit. Linda is now possessed by the Portuguese old man spirit and tries to kill Jim with an ax. They tussle, spirit possessed Linda tries to convince Jim he is the opening to the spirit world and the only way to close it is to kill himself. The detective shows up and tries to arrest Jim but Linda attacks him. Jim then shoots the Ouija board and that gets rid of the spirit but not before he is pushed out the window. 

Later we see Jim and Linda get married, so it all worked out for them. The landlady is cleaning up their messed up apartment and she find the bullet damaged Ouija board and a sequel is hinted out.

All the characters are unlikable and prone to sudden outbursts of rage. Since this was made the 1980's I'm not sure if these kids are 16 or 35. Jim and Linda live in a fancy older building that has been converted to apartments. He works in construction and maybe she is a college student, but we mostly see her hang out around the house. The ghost scenes are pretty weird. They talk about progressive entrapment over and over again which is funny. 

House II: The Second Story

Watched September 15, 2015

1987
Starring: Arye Gross, Jonathan Gross, Royal Dano, John Ratzenberger

Based on the cover art of the decomposed hand ringing the doorbell of a house and the description on the back of the box I figured this movie was about a haunted house that didn't want anyone to live in it. So it proceeds to attack the main character with ghost and ghouls. I was so wrong, this movie is not really a horror movie, it's like a weird fantasy movie with some strange horror aspects, kind of.  
A young couple in the 1950's give their baby away but are sad about it. Then they go back into their old Richardsonian Romanesque house. The wife hears something strange, the husband gets a shotgun then a ghost man named Slim Razor shoots them.

Twenty five years later, that baby is all grown up and he comes back to the house. Apparently the house has been in Jesse's (Arye Gross) family for years. Who raised him or who took care of the house for those 25 years is left unexplained. He shows up with his girlfriend, Kate (Lar Park-Lincoln) who works at a record agency. They are maybe moving into the house, but it wasn't clear to me. That night his friend Charlie (Jonathan Stark) and his girlfriend Lana (Amy Yazbeck) show up drunk because it's Jesse's birthday. Charlie and Lana are invited to stay in the house and they specifically play Lana's new demo really loud to get Kate interested and it works. Kate think Lana has some talent so she calls her boss John (Bill Maher) to come check out Lana's music.

Jesse is some sort of artist, but that doesn't amount to anything aside from Charlie giving him a copy of American Art that Jesse is featured in. Jesse in obsessed with the history of the house and finds some photos of his great-grandfather and a crystal skull. Jesse wants to know where the skull is so Jesse and Charlie dig up his grandfather's grave. As soon as they get the coffin out the ground and open, the crystal skull is there and a hand chokes Jesse. Jesse and his Great-Grandfather share the same name. The grandpa comes to life, he has been waiting for 70 years for someone to dig him up. They bring him back to the house where he tells them a bunch of stories in a crazy montage. Gramps and Charlie get drunk and drive Charlie's sportscar around, which is super weird since cars didn't exist in Gramps's day. Gramps says it's important to protect the crystal skull, so he puts in on the mantle.

While the guys were hanging out int he basement, a Halloween party has started. An old girlfriend of Jesse's shows up and hits on him which makes Kate mad and she eventually leaves with Lana and John. A beefy caveman with rough clown make up shows up and steals the crystal skull. He takes it up stairs into room that leads to a jungle dimension. Charlie happened to have an uzi in his car and with Jesse they go get the skull from the cave man. Just before Charlie is about to be killed by the caveman, a pterdactyl eats the caveman and takes the skull to it's nest. Jesse gets the skull but a baby Pteradactyl has it. They fall through the floor back into the house with a baby peterdactyl and a dog worm.

The party is now over as the house has been opened up to different time dimensions. Some Aztecs come and steal the skull next, but Charlie and Jesse can't tell where they went. The next day a electric repairman ( John Ratzenberger ) shows up to fix the wiring in the old house. Instead of fixing anything he rips a giant whole in the wall that leads to another dimension. He is not surprised as he has seen walls open to other dimensions before.  In that dimension they find the skull and the Aztecs who are sacrificing a virgin. Charlie and Jesse fight the Aztecs and get the skull back and save the girl. Back in the house with Gramps they all sit down to have a nice turkey dinner along with the woman they saved, the worm dog and the baby Pteradactyl. When Gramps pulls off the cover to reveal the turkey, instead it's the wild west bad guy Slim Razor who shoots Gramps. They are taken to the wild west zone and Jesse manages to shoot off Slim's head. The cops show up and surround the house because of all the previous gunfire. Slim comes back to life and shoots the cops. Charlie and the virgin are still tied up in the wild west dimension. Jesse defeats Slim and gets the skull but Gramps still dies. He grabs the Pteradactyl, the dog worm and heads to the wild west to live there forever.

The back of the VHS box that I have has this movie rated R, which doesn't make any sense. Elsewhere it seems rated PG-13, which seems like a better fit as nothing very terrible or gross happens. 

Part of my disappointment in this movie was thinking it was going to be a horror movie, not expecting a strange fantasy adventure tale. Since Jesse ends up in the wild west, is it possible that he is his own Grandpa? It's never explained why Gramps wanted the skull, was he trying to come back to life?  

They set up the girlfriends with backgrounds at the beginning but then they just leave after the party, so their stories don't go anywhere. This movie was very strange, there is a worm dog and a baby Pteradactyl, which I've never seen before as supporting characters. Even

Spiders II: Breeding Ground

Watched September 8, 2015

2001
Starring: Stephanie Niznik, Greg Cromer, Daniel Quinn, Richard Moll

On the high seas, a group of people are hanging out on a boat playing cards. They kill a large spider on the wall, foreshadowing the menace to come. Unexpectedly, some pirates board their boat, then knock out and kidnap several of the people.  As the pirates leave they throw a grenade on the boat to blow it up.

Next we see a married couple who is headed to Hawaii on a little sail boat. They encounter the boat from the beginning and it was only partially blown up. They board the burned out boat and see two dead bodies, the remains of the group. A storm comes out of nowhere, so the couple Alexandra (Stephanie Niznik) and Jason (Greg Cromer) get back on their boat and call in an SOS. They are quickly thrown off their boat and are stranded in the ocean.

Luckily, a large cargo ship shows up and takes them aboard. The cargo ship doesn't say where they are headed, as they have a minimal crew and a crazy doctor onboard. Jason had cut his neck during the boat wreck, so he is given shots by the Doctor (Richard Moll). Alexandra is hit on by the captain, but she doesn't take it too seriously. Jason has a weird dream that he is being touched by a giant spider. Once he wakes up he snoops around and finds a cold storage room full of dead bodies. When he gets Alexandra to show her, the dead bodies are gone and it's just cow carcasses. She thinks he has a fever and is being crazy. They have a fight at the mess hall and the crew drags Jason away. 

The crazy doctor takes Jason to his lab where he is implanted with a spider egg by the queen spider. It wasn't a dream, this ship is full of spiders.  Alexandra has dinner with the Captain and he tries to make out with her. She pushes him away and goes to find Jason who is no longer in the recovery room. She tries to get to the lab where Jason is, but it's being heavily guarded. She turns off the power which releases all the spiders from their cages. Instantly the freed spiders start attacking the crew.

Alexandra finds Jason and tries gets him out to the deck, but he is weak from being a spider womb. They are attacked by spiders all along the way, but still manage to get to the deck of the ship. Jason  needs the antidote to the spider egg inside him, or he won't make it. The doctor still wants Jason so he can continue his experiment  with the spider that is inside him. A spider sneaks up on the doctor and kills him. 

Alexandra heads back to the lab to get the antidote. She fends off a spider then opens up a ton of barrels of flammable liquid. She escapes to the deck, gets Jason and herself onto the lifeboat, but the winch stops so they have to jump into the ocean. Then the cargo ship explodes. There is a spider that is almost the size of the ship, which is nuts. The coast guard helicopter finds them and starts to pull them up when one last spider pops out of a box and grabs Alexandra. It's dragging her down until the coast guard throws her a grenade. She pulls the pin to blow up the spider and they manage to escape onto the helicopter.

The CGI is terrible, it's like cut and paste spiders all over the place. They do use several animatronic spiders that look a lot better. In once scene, Alexandra takes the toothpick out of one of the shipmates mouth and stabs him in the cheek with it, later he puts it back in his mouth. It's not great, Alexandra and Jason are supposed to be in love but they fly into rages at each other pretty quickly. It's an intense acting style. Unless you're really into giant spiders, don't waste your time with this one.

The director also directed Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo.

C.H.U.D.II Bud the Chud

Watched September 1, 2015

1989
Starring: Brian Robbins, Bill Calvert, Tricia Leigh Fisher, Robert Vaughn

Having little to do with the first C.H.U.D. movie, this one tries the horror comedy approach to a sequel.

Colonel Masters (Robert Vaughn) is heading up a secret program to create C.H.U.D.'s as soldiers, but they can't seem to remove the cannibal part from their test subject, Bud. Bud (Gerrit Graham) tries to escape from the medical facility where they are testing on him. The soldiers and scientists freeze him with Nitroglycerin, essentially killing him. 

Meanwhile two teen friends, Steve (Brian Robbins) and Kevin (Bill Calvert) are in their high school biology class. After class ends they are in the back room of the lab putting frogs away when the corpse they are supposed to look out later is pushed out of the loading dock and rolls awat. They are worried they'll get in trouble for losing the body, so they go to the local disease control lab, which happens to be the same place that the military is testing C.H.U.D.s. They end up stealing Bud the C.H.U.D. They take him back to Steve's house and he ends up in the bathtub, then a hairdryer falls in the electrocutes him back to life. Steve and Kevin lock Bud in the basement to figure out what to do next. Bud easily escapes and bites Steve's miniature poodle. This turns the poodle into a C.H.U.D. too. I guess C.H.U.D.-ism is similar to how zombies become infected, in that everyone that is bit turns into a C.H.U.D. and can infect other people.

Steve and Kevin team up with their gal pal Katie (Tricia Leigh Fisher) to look for Bud. General Master is also looking for the C.H.U.D. Bud makes a bunch of friends and ends up on a farm, the government also finds Steve, Kevin and Katie there and try to arrest them. The C.H.U.D. group manages to escape.

 For some reason, the military know the C.H.U.D.s are attracted to large groups and there is a Halloween Dance at the high school that night. The C.H.U.D.s now have a whole posse and they all head down to the High school, synchronized dancing along the way. Steve and Kevin figure out that if you freeze then electrocute the C.H.U.D.'s you can cause them to explode, destroying them. Bud is attracted to Katie so she lures him and the the rest of the C.H.U.D.'s to the high school pool. They all fall/jump in, then Steven and Kevin throw nitroglycerin into the pool. Steve and Kevin rip and electrical line off the wall and throw it into the pool, causing all the C.H.U.D.'s explode, but not before Steve is bitten. All the C.H.U.D.'s are destroyed, Kevin finally tells Katie that he likes her romantically. Steve, now a C.H.U.D. tells his friends that he is off to explore the world. He hitches a ride with Colonal Masters, now a C.H.U.D. alond with a random woman played by Bianca Jagger.

The custom song Bud the C.H.U.D. is pretty great and plays often. I had some fun watching this movie, but that doesn't mean it's good. The makeup for all the C.H.U.D.'s is just some green face paint for the most part. The original C.H.U.D.'s were real mutants that looked pretty gross. Most of the laughs in this one fall pretty flat, but I did like all the great costumes at the high school Halloween Dance.

The Net

Watched August 25, 2015

1995
Starring: Sandra Bullock, Jeremy Northam, Dennis Miller

I've continued watching movies based around the internet that were made in the mid-1990's. The Net is another one on the list, it's less about virtual reality and more about the fear of all your information being accessible online.

Angela Bennett (Sandra Bullock) is a computer beta tester who loves the internet. She barely needs to leave the house because she can always order out from Pizza.net, her favorite online pizza delivery site. She lives in the larger Los Angeles area somewhere and works for Cathedral systems, an IT company based in San Francisco. Her mother has Alzheimer's and is in an assisted living facility. Angela visits her regularly, but it's hard watching her mother forget who she is. She doesn't have a lot of friends because she loves computer so much. A coworker from Cathedral Systems sends her a disk for a program they've been debugging called Mozart's Ghost. Once the program launches, there is a pi symbol in the bottom right corner, once pressed it opens a back door to top secret files. She talks to her coworker and they are both curious about what the pi symbol means. Her coworker wants to talk in person so her and he flies down in his personal plane down but a glitch in air traffic control computer makes him crash into some power plant towers. 

The next day Angela heads to Mexico for a beach vacation. That's where she meets Jack (Jeremy Northam.) He's kind of charming and creepy, but he manages to trick her into a date on his boat. A weird dude keeps watching them, eventually he steals Angela's purse on a beach walk. It's all a trap because Jack just wanted the Mozart's Ghost disk. He takes Angela further out on the boat to kill her, but she just thinks it's a nice date and they have sex. While he is below deck, she puts on her clothes and his jacket where she finds his gun. She asks him about the gun and he takes it from her saying it's for shark fishing, with a silencer. Luckily she took clip out so he couldn't shoot her.  She hits him with a bottle of wine, and escapes in the little motor boat only to crash into some nearby rocks. 

Several days later she wakes up in a Mexican hospital without any personal identification. At the US embassy they grant her a temporary visa with the name Ruth Marx, she reluctantly signs it even though the name is wrong. At the airport she goes to where she had left her car and it's gone. When  she gets to her house, it's for sale and open house is going on. Angela goes in and starts freaking out at the realtor.  The cops are called and Angela tries to explain her situation.  The cops run Ruth Marx's name, since that who they think Angela is and she has a bunch of warrants that Jack just added to get her into trouble. Angela escapes out the back door and steals the realtor's phone. She doesn't have any real life friends, but she has an ex-boyfriend Alan (Dennis Miller), who also used to be her therapist. Alan doesn't believe Angela's story at first, that her identity has been switched. They do get Angela checked into a hotel. 

Jack is still tracking Angela since he botched up killing her.  Jack and his group of bad guys mess with Alan's medication and give him penicillin which he is allergic to and he ends up in the hospital. He starts to recover but is then killed. He was the last person who could verify her identity, since her mom has Alzheimer's.

Angela is arrested and tells her story to her court appointed attorney, who doesn't believe her anyway. She is released from jail by a supposed FBI agent who turns out to being working for Jack. She manages to escape the clutches of the fake FBI guy and hitchhikes to San Francisco to the Cathedral offices to figure out who is behind the Pi symbol. She gets into the office and forces everyone out with a fire alarm. She finds out that Jeff Gregg Microsystems guy who created the whole Gateway security system included the Pi back door to manipulate information and people. She copies the info and runs to the Pan Pacific Computer Convention that just happens to be going on down the street. She finds a computer and emails the info to the FBI. Jack finds her chases her onto a cat walk where she hits him with a fire extinguisher and he falls, presumably to his death. The movie ends with her and her still Alzheimer's afflicted mom back at her house. She got her identity back, she is Angela Bennett again.

One of the funniest parts to me is when Jack is flirting with Angela at the Mexican resort. He traces her accent to Southeastern Colorado, which to my knowledge is not a region specific accent at all. Jack also call Angela a clever girl just like in Jurassic Park.

While Jack is still trying to seduce Angela and they are walking on the beach at night she gets cold. She is only wearing a crop top and Jack has a casual suit jacket on. Instead of offering her his jacket, her pulls a large napkin out of his pocket and ties it around her waist. 

It was alright, but overall too long. The pace could have been sped up. The hacking and internet stuff was pretty realistic. She ordered pizza on the net, which is something you can do today. It could easily be remade, the same security issues exist, but that doesn't necessarily make it a compelling movie.

Hard to Kill

Watched August 16, 2015

1990
Starring: Steven Seagal, Kelly LeBrock, William Sadler, Frederick Coffin

Mason Storm (Steven Seagal) is a tough cop who is on a stake out one night. He videotapes a mob/Senator conspiracy to kill the Senator's competitor. He calls in to the station with the incriminating information to his officer friend, but a corrupt cop who is also working for Senator Vernon Trent (William Sadler) overhears their conversation. 

With the conspiracy on both video and audiotape Mason goes home to his hot wife and young son. But the bad cop has sent some henchmen to take out Mason. The evil guys break into Mason's house, kill his wife, shoot him and try to shoot his son who escapes out the window. Mason is taken to the hospital and initially declared dead. It turns out that Mason is just barely alive but in a coma, his partner Kevin (Frederick Coffin) asks them to not reveal that he's alive to the press. Now identified as John Doe,  Mason is taken to the L.A. Coma Center. 

Seven years later, Mason is still in a coma. His nurse, Andy (Kelly LeBrock) brings a kitten to try to get him out of his coma. It's either the kitten or Andy admiring his dick that wakes him up from his coma. Once he is awake, Andy calls the police because she was given a code number to call in if her ever awoke. Unfortunately the same corrupt police guys hear the call and head to the hospital to kill Mason. Even though Mason has little muscle strength with Andy's help they escape the coma center. 

Andy drives them to Ojai, she has been house sitting for a friend but no one knows she is there so it'll make a good safe house. Mason begins to build up his strength with acupuncture and martial arts training. Andy helps him find out some information about what happened the night he was shot. It turns out his old partner Kevin has been raising Masons son, who survived and his son is safe from the bad guys at a boarding school. Andy and Mason begin a romantic relationship.  The bad guys are still after Mason, they manage to find Andy and track her back to the house. Where there is a crazy shoot out, but Mason and Andy escape. Mason's old house has been sold but it's being remodeled. He sneaks in and breaks open a secret panel to get the evidence of the Senator's conspiracy with the mob. 

Even though his son was safe at the boarding school, Kevin brings him to meet his dad. Mason has a fight with some more of the bad guys and saves his son from them. Due to the Senator always saying the same phrase, Mason recognizes his voice from the audiotape and puts it all together. Mason now has his target. He goes to the Senator's house and surprises the Senator's evil henchmen. Mason kills the corrupt cop who has been trying to kill him this whole time. He finds the Senator but doesn't kill him, instead he is arrested. Mason is reunited with Andy and his son, the new family will live happily ever after.


Steven Seagal in his prime, pretty fun action stuff. The kitten at the coma center is very cute, the fact that there is a dedicated coma center is great. Steven wears these tight light blue jeans that leave little to the imagination and it's too much. There are multiple camera shots where all you see are the crotch of those jeans. Both Steven Seagal and Kelly LeBrock had some crazy outfits and it was fun to find out in the credits that they're outfits were by Armani.

Conquest

Watched July 27, 2015

1983
Starring: Andrea Occhipinti, Jorge Rivero, Sabrina Siani

I had never heard of this movie before, it's pretty crazy but it fits into the early '80s Beastmaster type fantasy model. Lots of tiny loin clothes and crazy cave man adventures.
 
A young man, Ilias (Andrea Occhinpinti) is given a bow by his people with the task of going to a foreign land. Once he becomes a man he will be able to make the bow shoot laser arrows that go wherever he needs them.

The other land is ruled by Ocron (Sabrina Siani) a lady who wears a golden full head helmet and a tiny thong. She had something to do with making the sun rise. She rules a gang of weasel faced wookiees that kill people and bring the heads for her to eat the brains. Ocron has a vision of Ilias killing her, so she sends her minions to kill him first. She summons a demon god to bring more bad things to attack Ilias and Mace.

On his journey, Ilias meets up with Mace (Jorge Rivero) when Mace saves him from being attacked by Ocron's henchmen creatures. Mace is a random warrior who has no problem killing a man to take the boar that he has killed, even though he explains that he didn't kill the boar, he's on the side of the animals. Right before Mace saved Ilias, Ilias saved a mud haired girl from a snake.  Mace knows the girl's family, they share a sheep that they stole from some guy with the family. The girl and Ilias make eyes at each other as they eat the meat. They all go to the sleep but the girl wakes Ilias to go make out, but then the girl is killed by the Ocron's creatures. Ilias is kidnapped and Mace is knocked out. Mace comes to and finds Ilias tied up, but they manage to escape the creatures anyway. They are then attacked by a mysterious poisonous arrow plant. While running away, Ilias is hit and gets a really bad infection, that could kill him. Mace leaves him to find a special plant that could heal him, but he is attacked again. He does makes it back to save Ilias from the poison. Ilias decides that he'll never become a man and heads home in a handmade boat. Mace is then captured by Ocron's creatures, but Ilias comes back and by doing that becomes a man that can shoot laser arrows.

Back together, Ilias and Mace decide to find Ocron, but that night Ilias is sucked into a black light cave. Mace goes after him but can't see what's happening, once he finds Ilias he is already dead and decapitated. Elias's head is taken to Ocron, but she knows that Ilias still has his soul even though he is head. Mace burns Ilias's body and rubs the ashes on his face giving him the laser arrow power. Mace finds Ocron, who takes off her mask to reveal a monkey skull face. Then Mace kills her and she turns into a wolf. Mace leaves to fight another day.

Lots of crazy things happen in this movie. At the beginning a young girl is ripped in half, then decapitated. Ilias has a crazy leather crop top and loin skirt combo outfit. If you like lots of fighting, oozing wounds, and exclusively topless women this movie is for you. It gets a little slow in the middle but the action scenes make up for it. There is also a part where Mace is saves from drowning by some dolphins.

Mirror Mirror 2: Raven Dance

Watched July 13, 2015

1994
Starring: Tracy Wells, Roddy McDowall, Mark Ruffalo, Sally Kellerman

I was blown away to find the not that great movie Mirror Mirror has a sequel, but it was a surprise VHS find. 

Marlee (Tracy Wells) and her younger brother Jeffrey (Carlton Beener) are recouperating at a nunnery after the death of their parents. Marlee's much older step-sister Roslyn (Sally Kellerman) wants to get the money that was left by Marlee's parents. Roslyn has been working with Dr. Lasky (Roddy McDowall) to keep Marlee sedated until a certain date, I'm not completely sure. 

Marlee is not sedated the whole time, she invites a grunge band to come play in the nunnery's dance space but the mirror doesn't like them and they are all burnt to a crisp but Marlee and Jeffrey survive.  This only adds to Marlee and Jeffrey's state of shock.

Roslyn hires a crazy groundskeeper to torture Marlee so that she seems unfit to inherit the money. The haunted mirror is in Marlee's room. After the band was burned she lost partial sight, but when she looks at the mirror it's perfectly clear. She begins to dance again, her passion,  for the mirror and she falls in love with the mirror. This makes them mirror demon do her bidding. Jeffrey seems autistic a first, playing his violin, but he's fine and it turns out he's the only pure one the mirror demon can't touch. 

A young man, Christian (Mark Ruffalo) shows up randomly and starts hanging out with Marlee. The nuns explain that he's a former orphan. It seems that there are only there are only two nuns in the whole place. After a ton of dancing around by Marlee, the mirror demon goes berserk. It takes Dr. Lasky into the mirror zone, kills the groundskeeper with acid and makes Roslyn look old, her worst fear. The mirror then tries to kill the blind nun, but Jeffrey stabs it. This makes the demon come out to attack, but Christian takes one for the team and stabs the demon with a special knife. Marlee then wishes none of this happens and it takes her back in time to the trade places the very first woman who interacted with the mirror.

I found Mirror Mirror 2 to be long and boring. The plot of the older step sister trying to get money from Marlee didn't make a lot of sense. It makes the first Mirror Mirror look fantastic. There is too much dancing from Marlee, but it's kind of fun to see Mark Ruffalo in an early role. Overall it's really slow and dull with a very strange soundtrack.

The Hidden

Watched July 6, 2015

1987
Starring: Kyle MacLachlan, Michael Nouri, Claudia Christian

It begins with a crazy dude robbing a bank and shooting a bunch of hostages. He then steals a Lamborghini and leads the cops on the crazy chase that ends in a death defying shoot out and crash. The robber is super burned during the car crash but somehow is still alive and taken to the hospital. At the hospital, just before he dies he transfers his internal alien parasite into the man in the bed beside him. The parasite's new body has a heart condition and gastrointestinal distress, but the parasite manages to revive him and get itself out of the hospital.

Lloyd Gallagher (Kyle MacLachlan) shows up as an FBI agent from Seattle to work with Tom Beck (Michael Nouri) the local detective on the case for all the people that the first guy murdered. Lloyd knows to chase the second guy from the hospital because he has some clue to how the parasite works, but he doesn't say that. He doesn't even reveal to Tom that he knows it's an alien parasite.

The parasite guy steals money from a record store, kills the clerk and takes a boom box. He then steals a red Ferrari. The cops track him down to a strip club but he has already transferred the parasite to a stripper, Brenda (Claudia Christian.)  She wears this dress that just looks like a strapless red mini in the front, but the back is all straps with a huge dip that shows off her butt cleavage, it's nuts. Now infected, she fucks some random dude to death and steals his car. The cops chase her but she has a bunch of weapons from when the parasite was in its second body. Lloyd and Tom chase her from a car, but she runs out onto a roof top. She is shot a ton of times and Lloyd pulls out a crazy specialized weapon, but she jumps of the building before he can use it. She transfers the parasite to a dog before she dies.

The parasite goes from the dog to the owner who happens to work at the police station. At the police station, the parasite infected guy goes nuts and shoot up the place. Lloyd was acting so weird that Tom arrested him, but Tom now believes the alien parasite is real and get Lloyd out of jail. At the jail, the current parasite guy keeps shooting everything. Tom and Lloyd manage to shoot him, but the parasite jumps into another body first. 

It all comes down to showdown where the parasite manages to get into a Senator that is about to announce his candidacy for president. Lloyd and Tom manage to get to the hotel where the press conference is and they shoot the bad guy but Tom is shot in the process. They Senator is dying and thecops are going to arrest Lloyd for shooting him. Lloyd using a flame thrower to light the Senator on fire which draws out the parasite and allows Lloyd to use his special weapon to kill it. The Weirdest part is the very end. Tom is dying in the hospital, he has a wife and young daughter. It turns out that Lloyd was such a good parasite hunter, because he's an alien too. But a good alien who has been tracking the party parasite who just wants to create havoc on Earth for some time. Tom is going to die, so Lloyd transfer his alien into Tom's body, so that Tom's wife and daughter will still have a dad, even though it's an alien dad.

This movie is great! The parasite is so gross and like a teenager, into slutty chicks, fast cars and loud music. I can't believe that I hadn't heard of this movie before, I highly recommend it.

Timecop

Watched June 29, 2015

1994
Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Ron Silver, Mia Sara

Time travel loops often don't make sense, can you exist in the same place as yourself? Timecop tries to explain this, but it's not perfectly clear. Walker (Jean-Claude Van Damme) is a cop in 1994 who's newly pregnant wife is killed by some people where were trying to kill him. Jump to 2004 and he's now a time cop. At some point in the 1990's, time travel was invented, but they didn't want it to get into the wrong hands. Criminals figure out to how to time travel to commit time crimes, stealing famous treasures or investing in stocks. Walker now travels back in time to stop these thieves, but he is consumed with the loss of his wife and unborn child.

The officers somehow manage to track who is time travelling and can tell when someone is in the wrong place in time. Walker is sent back to 1929 to stop a stock market crash opportunist who was sent by McComb (Ron Silver) to make a bunch of money. McComb is a senator in 2004 who is running for president, but he needs money to fund his campaign.

The time cop initiative is losing funding because it is run by McComb, who only wants it for his own gain. Walker is sent back to 1994 with Fielding (Gloria Reuben) to stop another time crime. It turns out that Fielding was hired by McComb and she betrays Walker. Fielding is shot and Walker just barely makes it back to his own time. Now the time cop program is really being shut down, but Walker now has a plan to finally stop McComb. He manages one last trip back to 1994, and he is able to find his wife before she was killed.

At his house, Walker's past and future selves are trying to stop McComb and his henchman. 2004 McComb is going to blow everything up in the house including himself because his 1994 self will continue and become president in 2004. Walker brings 1994 McComb and pushes him into 2004 McComb where they merge and die. You cannot occupy the same place with two different time selves. Now is this timeline, Walker and his wife survive and McComb never becomes president.

There are some great action scenes, Walker kicks a man's frozen arm off and he does underwear splits to avoid getting electrocuted. The rule of not being able you can't touch you past future self because the same matter can't exist in the same place at the same time is very strange.There is a super gross and sensual love scene with Walker and his wife Melissa (Mia Sara.) I wish it had been cut out. There is a very dated roller blader at the mall. All of McComb's henchmen have the worst haircuts, but it's a very fun and enjoyable movie.

Virtuosity

Watched June 22, 2015

1995
Starring: Denzel Washington, Russell Crowe, Kelly Lynch

Parker Barnes (Denzel Washington) is an imprisoned former cop who was incarcerated after he killed some innocent bystanders during a stand off with a psycho serial killer who kidnapped and killed his wife and daughter. He is still a good cop so he has been recruited for a virtual reality program to train cops for intense scenarios. During a test of the program, named SID 6.7 (Russell Crowe) the other prisoner is killed in real life when his brain is overloaded in the digital world.

The programmer, Lindenmeyer (Stephen Spinella) who created SID is obsessed with it/him.  He is approached by a man working in cybernetics to turn one of Lindenmeyer's sexy lady programs into a real being. Instead Lindenmeyer tricks the cybernetics guy into making SID into a cyborg. SID immediately escapes and begins killing people. His programming is that of tons of serial killers so he starts recreating some of those murders like the Tate-LaBianca murders by the Manson family. Even though Parker is still in jail, they recruit him as the only man who can track SID down, because one of SID's inspirations in the same man who killed Parker's family.

After his Manson style killing, SID goes to Media Zone, the coolest club and takes a bunch of people hostage. Parker shows up in time to chase him out of the club, but SID manages to escape again. SID has a special regeneration powers with nanobots, as long as they can get glass to take the silicon out of he can rebuild any damaged part of himself.

Parker teams up with Madison Carter (Kelly Lynch) the criminal psychologist who is also on the case to try to determine what SID will do next.  After a train incident where they think that Parker shot a lady when it was SID, they lock Parker up and tell him that the tracking device they implanted in his brain has a neurotoxin that they can release if he escapes. SID wants to play the game so he kills the drivers and give Parker the keys to free himself.

SID kidnaps Madison's 10-year-old daughter and takes over a TV station that is having a heated debate on immigration. SID just wants people to watch him. Parker cuts the phone feed and it seems like all his viewers have left, which makes SID crazy. Parker chases SID onto the roof of the television station.  During their battle, SID falls through a bunch of glass that cuts him into pieces. He starts to regenerate then Parker rips his chip out. But SID was the only one who knows where Kelly's daughter is being held, so what is Parker to do?

Jump to an alternate cut where Parker is thrown from the building and killed, but it's now the virtual world, but SID doesn't know it. SID shows Madison where her daughter is, the Madison detaches from the virtual world. Parker came back to to life in the digital world and is still battling SID, because Lindenmeyer won't let Parker out the digital world. SID almost fries Parker's brain in real life, but Lindenmeyer is killed and Parker can escape. Parker uses the tricks he learned from when his wife and daughter were killed to make sure he can get Madison's daughter out alive.

In comparing 1995 digital thrillers, this movie is way better than Johnny Mnemonic. The digital effects are pretty good, I feel they hold up mostly because they aren't trying to create realistic effects, the effects are for a digital world. Russell Crowe is a good villain and Denzel is great.  The programmer is the worst and I can't believes they didn't hold him accountable for bringing SID to life, he really had it in for Denzel for some reason. When SID feeds on glass to make his limbs grow back it's pretty cool.

Ed and His Dead Mother

Watched June 15, 2015

1993
Starring: Steve Buscemi, Ned Beatty, Miriam Margolyes, John Glover

Ed (Steve Buscemi) runs a hardware store that his parent's established before they died. His mother passed about a year ago but he can't seem to get over the loss. He shares the same house that he grew up in with his Uncle Benny (Ned Beatty). A mysterious salesman, Mr. Pattle (John Glover) comes to the hardware store and tells Ed he can bring his mom back for $1000. Ed agrees, but when the Mr. Pattle digs up the mom, her corpse is in terrible shape so it costs a little more to find some replacement organs. Eventually she makes it back to the house and it seems like she is just as she was.

Uncle Benny, who is Ed's mom's brother is upset about this resurrection because he disliked her meddling. Ed's mother doesn't act exactly the same, she now sits in the fridge at times, which is strange. After a day she passes out and is dead again. Mr. Pattle comes back and says for some more money he can tell Ed how to keep giving more life to his mom, so she'll stay alive. Steve agrees and now he has to feed his mom two live cockroaches a day. Somehow the mom eats too many cockroaches and is filled with a renewed lust for life. She starts chasing down the neighbor's dog to eat it, to get more life energy inside her.

Meanwhile, Ed's new neighbor Storm (Sam Sorbo) is aggressively trying to seduce him for no real reason. This leads Ed to be distracted from keeping his blood thirsty mom inside the house. Ed's mom is visited by a disgruntled former employee of the hardware store. Ed's mom treats him cordially, offering him tea, then killing him with a chainsaw. 

Ed goes back to Mr. Prattle, who's job it is to just milk all the life insurance money that Ed received, didn't want the mom to become homicidal. Mr. Prattle tells Ed that for $50,000 he can share the secret of how to get rid of the mother permanently. The instructions are this: Ed has to chop off her head and bury it in the certain part of the cemetery, then bury her body in another part, and he has to do it at a certain time of night. 

After her first human kill, Ed's mom goes to the hardware store and gets a large riding lawnmower to attack her next victim. Her next victim happens to be Storm, but Ed shows up in time to chop off his mom's head. He does manage to bury her head, but just as he is getting the body from the car, the cops show up for a separate incident in the church yard.

Steve ends up going to trial for the murder of his mother, even though he just had to kill her again to stop her from murdering more people. The film is bookended by a black and white sequence of the Ed at the trial for his mother's murder. It seems like the whole thing must have been a dream, but in the end it's not and he is acquitted for killing him mom. Storm turns out to have been hired by the same company as Mr. Prattle to make sure that they got the money out of Ed. After Ed's mom goes nut, Storm quits her job and falls in love with Ed for real.

A very interesting dark comedy. Steve's motivations are so hard to determine because we don't meet his mother until she comes back. A year is a long time to sit in the ground and then come back to life. You have to suspend your disbelief to get into the story. They do a good job of answering some obvious questions that would have been plot holes in other movies. Such as why a super sexy neighbor lady would want to seduce Ed, and the answer is that it was her job.

A Gnome named Gnorm

Watched June 11, 2015

1990
Starring: Anthony Michael Hall, Claudia Christian, Jerry Orbach

I've had this movie for a couple years and I keep bringing it to movie night but due to an aversion to family friendly fare it has never been picked. I took one for the team and watched it by myself, which I'm sure made it a little less enjoyable then it could have been as a shared experience, but it wasn't that great anyway. 

Casey (Anthony Michael Hall) is somehow a rookie detective on the police force even though he looks to be about 18 years old at best. He somehow is in a relationship with fellow detective Sam (Claudia Christian) even though they don't have any chemistry. Casey has been on a case trying to nail some diamond thieves and a complicated sting has been set up in a park. There is supposed to be a mole that will take the hand off with the bad guy. Casey is there to arrest them. Somehow an explosion goes off that knocks Casey unconscious before he can catch the bad guy. Sam was waiting in the car and by the time they got over their the bad guy was gone. Casey wakes up and is fine but is convinced that there is a witness in the empty park. He finds a leather bag with a strange stone in it. He heads home but is followed by a curious little guy. Gnorm the Gnome reveals himself to Casey because he wants his bag back, it contains his lumen stone.  Casey traps Gnorm in a cage, and is happy to have a witness even if no one will believe what he has. Gnorm has a special ability to make people fall asleep, so he escapes the cage and tries to get his lumen stone back. Casey convinces Gnorm to help his solve his case by finding the bag guy. 

Sam wants to help Casey even though the chief of police, Stan (Jerry Orbach) doesn't think Casey is competent. Casey and Gnorm cruise through town trying to track down the bag guy, Gnorm can speak some English and does remember some events from that night. Casey disguises Gnorm as a little kid and they cruise the boardwalk. Gnorm is pretty into butts, it is a strange sexual tone for a kids movie.

They do keep getting closer to catching the bad guy. Gnorm is eventually taken into the police station and strip searched, so you get to see some bare gnome butt. Casey keeps figuring out the clues and it turns out that it was Stan that set up the whole thing because he has it in for Casey. After a shoot out they manage to capture Stan. Casey helps Gnorm get some sun for him lumen to take back to his people so he can be the hero.

Super weird tone for a kids movie. Gnorm is very weird looking. Not partiuclary funny, even though Gnorm bites a bad guys butt and there are several nut shots.  He pronounced it G-Nome and G-Norm Whenever Gnorm is walking around looking cool his theme is Lowrider. Mostly just weird, I wouldn't want to watch it again.

Gor

Watched June 8, 2015

1987
Starring: Urbano Barberini, Rebecca Ferratti, Jack Palance

Tarl Cabot (Urbano Barerini) is a modern day physics professor who is regarded as a nerd. His friends treat him like it's high school and he's not very popular. He has a special ring, while driving home he somehow activates it and is transported to Gor, another world.

Tarl is dropped into the middle of a village that breaks out into battle. The bad guys have stolen the home stone, which is somehow related to Tarl's magic ring. Tarl is beat up during the battle over the stone and knocked unconscious. He is then dressed in a tiny loin cloth and nursed back to health by Talena (Rebecca Ferratti). Talena is a warrior princess and represents her people in trying to get their home stone back. She sees something in Tarl and brings him along. First they have to train Tarl to become a better warrior. A group of them begin a trek across the desert to find the bad guys who stole the home stone.

They have several adventures along the way and pick up some more people for their cause. Talena has to pretend to be a slave when the enter a specific village, then she is forced to fight another woman at a tavern. Luckily she wins and they all escape. 

They do get to bad guys place and after a battle get the home stone and free Talena's father, who was captured at some point. Just as Tarl is beginning to like Gor, his magic ring sends him back to his world.

Some other stuff happens but that is not what the movie is about. It's about a ton of butts in loincloths. Everyone has tiny outfits and many shots are at butt level. Also another example of English dubbing that mostly lines up with their lips but still seems off. It is an Italian production so maybe it was the case that they did speak English but they wanted more American accents. The technology of Gor is very strange, they have high heeled shoes and locks but haven't figured out wheels. If you like butts and lots of sword fights, this movie is for you.

Thirst

Watched May 18, 2015

1979
Starring: Chantal Contouri, Shirley Cameron, Henry Silva, Rod Mullinar

Kate (Chantal Contouri) is a professional lady about to take some time off from work. Apparently she is the descendant of a vampire clan, but she in unaware of this. A group of scientific vampires kidnap her and take her to a farm where they keep humans that they milk the blood out of like cows. The scientists are convinced that they just need to awaken the blood thirst that is in her genes for her to claim her vampire destiny. They drug her and perform various experiments to try to convince her that she wants to drink blood.They don't do a very good job of making her like the blood. They make her hallucinate so that she is surrounded by mysterious forces, and they only stop when she drinks blood.

After the initial tests don't seem to work, they let her go back home and to work but then she bites her friend and her boyfriend. The scientists bring her back for more conditioning but it still doesn't seem to work. They invite her to participate in a special ritual, they give her fangs to bite one of the human blood cows and she does it. Even though she has now had some blood, she still doesn't embrace her inherent vampirism. The group also kidnapped her boyfriend and brought him to the farm, one of the doctors tries to help them both escape. The doctor pushes the lady scientist into a blood vat, and she dies. The doctor and Kate escape on a helicopter but another scientist grabs on. When he falls off he falls onto power lines. Kate is taken to a weird basement cave where her boyfriend is being drained of his blood. The doctor says that Kate can drink him, but she doesn't want to. Then Kate lets the doctor drink from her. She then seems to embrace her vampire heritage.

Good special effects, it's slow in places, but overall pretty interesting. The exposition of the story can be frustrating. I did want Kate to escape the vampires and it seems like she resists for so long, so it's disappointing when she succumbs. Since they are constantly drugging Kate it's so confusing what is real or fake for her. If I was trying to turn someone into a vampire I wouldn't make them have terrible drug trips I would make the vampire lifestyle seem really glamorous, but the scientists don't take that approach.

Ghost Story

Watched May 11, 2015

1981
Starring: Fred Astaire, Melvyn Douglas, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., John Houseman, Craig Wasson, Alice Krige

A man in a high rise apartment in New York gets out of the bath but the water keeps running. On the bed, a woman is lying face down naked. The man keeps asking "Who are you?" to the woman, he touches her and she is cold.  She turns around the reveal a skeleton face, scared he backs into a window, crashes through and falls out.  As he falls, his towel is blown off so you see dick as he plummets to the ground and dies.

Four old men; Ricky (Fred Astaire), Dr. Jaffrey (Melvyn Douglas), Edward (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.), and Sears (John Houseman) are friends who live in a small town in Vermont. They regularly get together to tell ghost stories as members of The Chowder Society. It was Edward's son who died by falling out of the window. His other son, David (Craig Wasson) comes to mourn with his father and is convinced there is something suspicious about his brothers death. David then shares with The Chowder Society that he slept with Don's financé. David met Alma (Alice Krige) while he was a professor at a college in Florida and she was a secretary.  He was seeing someone else but he was compelled to ask Alma out. They went on a date where she put ice cream all over his face, then getting caught in the rain when back to her house from a crazy sex romp. They got engaged but David called it off after he discovered she was a night creeper. Alma leaves David then goes after Don.

Edward happens to be the mayor of the town. During a snowstorm he is compelled to walked out onto a bridge. On the bridge he sees a different skeleton face, scared falls off the bridge into the frozen river.

After Dr. Jaffrey of the Chowder Society also dies, they let the David in the group and they share their big group secret. In the 1920's they were all friends in college. A new lady, Eva came into town and they all liked her. She tried to sleep with Edward but he couldn't which is was severely disappointed by. All the boys got drunk one night and came over to Eva's house. They hint they all want to sleep with her but Edward doesn't like that. Since she was disappointed by Edward, Eva seems into the idea and she threatens to reveal his sex secret but he pushes her and she falls into the stone fireplace. She doesn't have a pulse so they decide to put her in the car and drive her into the pond. As the car is going down she comes to life, but they can't save her.

The house she stayed in is now abandoned, but a mysterious man and boy are squatting there. It seems that Eva convinced them to work for her, even though she is dead. David and Ricky go to the house, but the David falls and breaks his leg. Sears goes for help but crashes into a snowbank and the weird kid bites him. Ricky leaves David in the freezing house because he is convinced that Eva is still trapped in the car haunting them. Ricky manages to convince the police to pull the car out of the frozen lake,  just as that is happening she is trying to seduce and kill the David. They get the car out of the lake and her rotted corpse falls out, finally at peace out of the water.

Good example of not judging a movie by it's cover, which made it look pretty boring. The back of the box description didn't help either, so I was wary. It turned out to be pretty fun, the mystery haunting is cool and there is way more nudity and sex than I ever expected from a movie with a bunch of old men in it.

Terrible Movie Nights Zine Issue 4

The latest issue (#4!) of the Terrible Movie Night zine is now available in the store. Lots of gems like My Demon Lover, Johnny Mnemonic, The Visitor, Cellar Dweller and more are reviewed within. There are even lots more spot illustrations that you can't find on the site, plus I take time to actually edit it so it's not filled with spelling and grammar errors like the blog. Check it out!

Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight

 Watched April 27, 2015

1995
Starring: Billy Zane, William Sadler, Jada Pinkett Smith, Brenda Bakke, John Kassir

I like Tales from the Crypt in all its forms from the comics to the HBO show and then the various movies over the years. I very much enjoy the Cryptkeeper's puns, so I was excited to watch this movie.

The Cryptkeeper bookends the movie as he is directing his own horror movie, but it doesn't seem that he is directing the movie we are watching. Well, it wasn't clear at the end even though he did go to the premiere of Demon Knight.

Demon Knight starts with Brayker (William Sadler) being chased by The Collector (Billy Zane). It is unclear who is the good guy initially.  Brayker jumps out of his car to get away the The Collector who crashes his car into the stalled car. They both manage to survive the crash, but the cops show up to investigate. The Collector convinces the cops that Brayker has his property. Brayker makes his way to a rundown motel. He gets a room, but then the cops show up. The Collector wants a special key that Brayker has and it seems like The Collector is the true owner. One of the cop hesitates, so The Collector punches him in the face with his fist going through his head. They struggle and The Collector rips off the cop's head. It's pretty apparent that The Collector is the bad guy. Brayker kicks The Collector out of the house and protects the threshold with blood from the key.

The Collector cuts his hand releasing green blood onto the ground. From the dirt sprouts an army of demons that begin to the attack the house. Brayker quickly runs around trying to seal all the entrances with his magic blood. After a couple of demon attacks, the motel inhabitants check the basement to see if there is a way to escape. They find a boarded off tunnel, but Brayker thinks it's safer to just stay in the motel. All the people want to get out so they run into the tunnels, but the demons are there. They are chased to the upper floor of the motel and manage to create a magical seal, but the demons gather below.

The Collector's powers let him invade the minds of the remaining people in the motel. Roach (Thomas Haden Church) is convinced that if he just gives The Collector they key he will leave. Roach steals the key from Brayker and gives it to The Collector. The Collector instantly kills Roach and part of the seal protecting the upper floor is broken. Before they are attacked Brayker explains that the key holds the blood of Christ and it's one of seven keys. The demons have six of the seven keys, this being the last. Once they have it they can destroy the world, so it's up the Brayker the current Demon Knight to protect it. Brayker has been a Demon Knight for a long time and he was specifically lead to the motel to find Jeryline (Jada Pinkett Smith.) It is coming to the end and Brayker transfers the knowledge of the Knights to Jeryline just before he is attacked by The Collector. 

By this point everyone has been killed by the demons except for Jeryline. She covers herself in the blood from the key so she can't be touched by The Collector. But The Collector grabs her and throws her in the shower, and pours all the blood out of the key. Jeryline takes a swig of the blood and as The Collector dances around killing her she spits the blood in his face and he is destroyed. Jeryline is now the Demon Knight. She refills the key with blood from Brayker, as it's a holy line and heads on her way to keep the key safe.

Billy Zane is the bad guy with lots of charisma.  A little kid who becomes a demon and tries to lick out Brayker's heart. The demons have to be stabbed through the eyes to release their souls. CCH Pounder has her arm ripped off, then sacrifices herself by detonating a vest of grenades to kill a bunch of the demons. Lots of fun and pretty gross.

Curse of the Devil

Watched April 13, 2015

1973
Starring: Paul Naschy, Fabiola Falcon, Mariano Vidal Medina, Martiza Olivares

The VHS tape we watched broke about halfway through so I though that curse of the devil is pretty strong. It made a crazy noise in the VCR and it just wouldn't continue, I've never had a tape do what this one did. Luckily this movie is available in its entirety on Youtube and it's a much better version than the copy that broke.

It begins in Medieval times where two knights are having a duel. Some witches are watching them fight. One of the knights is killed, and the main witch swears vengeance for his death. That night the coven of witches perform a ritual and drain the blood of one of the men into a cup. They are interrupted and killed before they can finish the rite, but before the main witch dies she mutters a curse. 

Jump to the mid 1800's, (that's my guess anyway). A new generation of witches who are descendents of the original and have the same vendetta. They have another ceremony and transfer the curse of the werewolf to Waldemar (Paul Naschy) a local nobleman, who happens to be a descendent of the original knight. The witches transfer the curse by indoctrinating a local woman, she is then abandoned on the street. Waldemar finds the woman and takes her into his palace. He then sleeps with her and she uses the special wolf skull to give him the werewolf curse. Coincidentally there is a crazy man that has been killing random people and it's made everyone be on high alert.

A Professor and his family come to visit from Budapest. Valdemar starts courting the oldest daughter Kinga (Fabiola Falcon) and they jump in the sack right away.  Kinga's younger sister Maria (Martiza Olivares) tries to seduce Waldemar but he instead turns into a werewolf and kills her. The Pofessor's family and local law enforcement want to catch the killer. Kinga is given advice from Waldemar's housekeeper that he is now a werewolf and they only way to kill him is with a dagger to the heart. A mob gathers chasing Waldemar around, but Kinga gets to him first and manages to stab in his the heart. The curse of the werewolf is over, but then we find out that Kinga was pregnant with Waldemar's baby. Jump to the future and she has a half werewolf son.
 
I would give Witches and Werewolves as an alternate title to this movie, the devil doesn't make an appearance. Originally in Spanish, it's dubbed in English but it works fine. It's slow and strange in the classic low budge '70s way. The blood is a bright, creamy red. But there are some great werewolf kill scenes and the werewolf costume is pretty fun.

Soulkeeper

Watched April 6, 2015

2001
Starring: Rodney Rowland, Kevin Patrick Walls, Brad Dourif, Tommy 'Tiny' Lister.

Yet another movie with a lenticular VHS box cover that has been passed over for months. I finally got it back on the list and somehow it was picked. I had low expectations and unexpectedly they paid off.

A mysterious group wearing dark robes in engaged in a secret ceremony. They are trying to transfer a soul into a specific body. A member of the group is randomly chosen and is pushed onto the altar where a special stone is placed on his chest. The stone is carved with a symbol that beings to move and change. The soul power descends into the sacrifice but it kills him and all the participants of the ritual.

Corey (Rodney Rowland) and Terrence (Kevin Patrick Walls) are two small time thieves. They are at a museum of the civil war during a battle reenactment. They are both dressed as Abraham Lincoln, Corey is reciting a speech to distract the tour group while Terrence tries to break into a case. They botch the job and are chased out of the museum with the guard hot on their trail. 

At their local watering hole, they are bemoaning their loss and how terrible they are at their job. Two attractive ladies are staring them down, so they go over to try to hit on them. The women are very robotic and strange, but the guys don't care and they follow the ladies to a strange house. The women disappear as Corey and Terrence enter the house. Inside they find Pascal (Brad Dourif) who wants them to do a job for him. He tells them to go to a graveyard and find a specific coffin. They take the job as it pays pretty well, but the specifics of their task are unclear.

In the spooky cemetery they find the right grave and open the tomb of FF. Inside is a skeleton but there is a strange metal canister in its neck. They open the canister to find a bunch of newspaper clippings. They take these clippings to Chad (Tommy 'Tiny' Lister) who has a perfect penis (!?) and a bunch of computers to try to figure out what the clippings mean.

The next stop is a sex club. Everyone in the club looks very uncomfortable, they are all rubbing each other and eating different fruits that turns to blood. Corey finds a lady he likes and they go have sex in a private room. Terrence ends up with a curly haired brunette who turns into Deborah Gibson while going down on him, then into his mother. He freaks out, finds Corey and they run away. They run into the soul sucking monster called Magus but manage to escape.

Continuing their search for who knows what exactly, they enter a cave and find that FF has been soul incarnated as a 12-year-old boy surrounded by hot chicks. The boy tries to explain the cult, the demon and how souls figure into it, but it's still unclear. The boy gives them some groovy clothes, as they had to walk through a sewer to find the cave. He leads them out of the cave.

 Now they have on cool '70s bell bottoms, but they still don't know what they're looking for, or I just never knew. They run into another mysterious guys who explains what needs to happen next. He lets them know about the soul stone and the demon that is trying to possess it. He tells them that the Magus monster is attracted to sin, so they have to go to church to confess all their sins and boy do they have a lot. After they are cleaned from their sins they can sneak up on the monster. They suit up in some crazy gear and head to the castle where a new group of cult members is trying to resurrect the stone's power. They make it to the castle but Corey's use the lord's name in vain, so the monster comes after them. The cult member's use Corey's body in the soul ceremony, but it doesn't work because he channeled his soul power himself. They fight with the cult guys and get out of the castle to fight the monster one on one. Terrence jumps on the monster and uses his bomb to blow them both up, only Corey escapes alive.

During the movie Corey described his dream woman: red hair, glasses, big boobs, smart but really into cars. At a gas station where his bus stops Corey is buying something when his dream woman walks in. Her wigs is really fake, but through some happenstance she offers him a ride in her sports car, so off they ride to fall in love.

I enjoyed it! The comedy bits worked, which is rare in a horror comedy. A lot of stuff didn't make sense but it was still silly and fun.