Greetings, readers.  It’s time for another round of Netflix Roulette, and quite honestly I need a break from SFCOM creature-features already.  I’d heard decent things about this piece of post-apocalyptic 1980s cheese, so I decided, “Why the Hell not?” And here we are.

Spoilers ensue.

Welcome to the future.  Sam Treadwell (David Andrews) is a businessman in Anaheim who deals in salvage dug out of the post-apocalyptic wasteland beyond Anaheim, and he has a lovely blonde wife, Cherry.  Cherry 2000, that is, she’s a sex-robot.  Unfortunately, an accident involving sex on the kitchen floor while the dishwasher malfunctions and fountains soapy water results in her blowing a fuse.

Sam is distraught, especially when he discovers she can’t be repaired (Gort and Robby the Robot have a cameo in the dealership/repair shop).  He won’t settle for any other sex-robot — he needs another Cherry 2000.  Unfortunately, this model is extremely rare — and in this post-apocalyptic world, demand far exceeds supply for…everything.  This is a strange and terrifying future, where casual sex is regulated by contracts and lawyers — and keep an eye out for Laurence “Larry” Fishburne as a lawyer hammering out a contract!

With no other options, Sam heads into the wasteland, to a little town called Glory Hole (heh) in search of a Tracker to help him find a replacement Cherry 2000 somewhere in the wasteland.  See, Sam kept his Cherry’s memory chip, so if he finds an intact Cherry 2000 chassis, he can pop the chip in and have his old girlfriend back.

He finds E. Johnson (Melanie Griffith, before she got famous), a red-haired beauty who is also the best Tracker around.  She agrees to take him to “Zone 7 — the Robot Graveyard” to find his doll.  He initially balks at the idea of going himself, but she refuses to go without someone riding shotgun — Zone 7 is the most dangerous area in the wasteland, controlled by the brutal warlord “Lester” (Tim Thomerson).  And by “brutal warlord” I mean “post-apocalyptic yuppie in a floral shirt having a cook-out.”  I mean, don’t get me wrong, he’ll still blow your head off.

Pretty soon Sam and Johnson are in a race against time to get to the Robot Graveyard, find a Cherry and get out before Lester catches up to them.  But through all this, has Sam learned that love is better when it doesn’t come preprogrammed?

THE END!

Ah, the 1980s Post-Apocalyptic Movie.  Capitalizing on the success of the Mad Max franchise, it seems like everyone and their dog put on a Post-Apocalyptic movie in the 1980s.  It was easy enough — find yourself a desert, some scrap metal, and a costume designer everyone has called mad and you’re ready to start rolling.  CHERRY 2000 is a fairly middle of the road sort of Post-Apocalyptic movie, but it’s got some good points.

There’s a surprisingly sharp vein of social commentary throughout the film, from the contract lawyers for casual sex to Lester’s twisted parody of 1950s suburban life.  There’s a persistent skewering of 1980s’ social mores, particularly Yuppie-ism and crass consumerism, as the primary form of industry in America in this dystopic future seems to be salvaging the material goods of the previous era and selling it to other people.  In the light of both society’s materialism and the way sex has become over-litigious, it’s little wonder that Sam should prefer a sex-robot for companionship, even bonding emotionally with her.

Final Analysis: A fun little Post-Apocalyptic romp, with some good comedic elements and entertaining social commentary.

Overall, I give CHERRY 2000 (1987)…

THREE BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

Greetings, readers! Today’s film is one of Roger Corman’s latest productions, a SyFy Channel Original Movie based on the persistent urban legends surrounding “camel spiders,” allegedly large arachnids native to the Middle East which can outrun a jeep, jump, scream, inject paralytic poison, dissolve flesh, and get their name from their disconcerting habit of laying their eggs in the stomachs of camels, from which the larva burst out, ALIEN-style.  In truth, “camel spiders,” AKA Wind-Scorpions, AKA Sun Spiders, are native to temperate and tropical deserts around the world, lack venom (though their large pincers can deliver a painful bite), lay their eggs normally, and aren’t even actually spiders.  Members of the arachnid family Solifugidae, camel spiders will only bite if you try to repeatedly poke them in the face, preferring a diet of crickets and other small insects, which they capture using sticky pads on their front appendages.  Entomology lesson out of the way, on to the film.

Spoilers ensue.

In the midst of a firefight between American and insurgent forces in the Middle East, the Islamic forces are overwhelmed by a force of giant arachnids (we’re talking beagle-sized) and dragged away.  One of the Americans is killed in the firefight, and zipped into a body bag for shipment back home.  Unbeknownst to anyone else, a number of smaller versions of these arachnids, called “Bishbish” by the locals, have hidden in the body.

The truck transporting the body across the Arizona desert is involved in an accident, and the coffin (a plywood box) is thrown from the back.  The arachnids escape into the desert, and soon begin to kill, grow and breed.

The principal cast, led by Sheriff Beaumont (C. Thomas Howell) and Captain Sturges (Brian Krause) are initially holed up in a diner, but when the building’s integrity is compromised by Camel Spiders, they escape in the army truck.  The truck being damaged and not up for a long trip, everyone holes up at an old gypsum mine.  And fortunately for them, that plywood box? Not a coffin, but a box of automatic rifles.  Can this ragtag band of refugees hold out against the onslaught of camel spiders long enough for help to arrive?

THE END?

This is sort of a Kraft Macaroni and Cheese kind of film.  It fills you up, but leaves you wanting more in terms of flavor.

I really shouldn’t write reviews when I’m hungry.

Executively produced by Roger Corman, and directed by Jim Wynorski (under his pseudonym “Jay Andrews”), I kind of expected more fun from this film.  Don’t get me wrong; it’s not a terrible film, and it’s certainly above many SyFy Channel Original Movies, but it left me wanting more.

Much of the cast is painted into cartoonishly broad stereotypes — the worst offender being a woman in the diner who’s bitter divorce from her husband is interrupted by the arrival of the Camel Spiders.  Not only does she tell her soon-to-be-ex husband to drop dead (telling him this in a normal speaking voice while surrounded by complete strangers, no less), but when their young daughter tearfully asks, if they get out alive, will she and daddy get back together? The bitch just looks at her and tells her no.  Cold.

The special effects (i.e., the CGI Camel Spiders) are precisely what you’d expect, with the shiny, artificial-looking spiders not seeming to actually interact with their environment, simply overlaid on top of it.  The most egregious example of this occurs in the final sequence, where after camel spiders destroy the film at a drive-in, their silhouettes are projected on the blank screen.  Some of them (who am I kidding? All of them) are walking in directions and depicted at angles that would require the spiders to be floating in the air.  Normally I can look past this sort of thing, but this just felt sloppy.

Final Analysis: All in all, not the romp I was hoping for.  Not a bad creature-feature, but it could have been so much more.  And for the record, Camel Spiders, like all arachnids, have eight walking legs, not six as the film reiterated several times.

Overall, I give CAMEL SPIDERS (2011)…

TWO BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE

Greetings, readers. The weather is getting warmer, there’s only one thing on my mind. Long time readers will recall that once the weather warms up each year, I start getting the itch to watch creature features, especially Syfy Channel Original Movies. I don’t know what it is, but sunshine makes me crave burying myself in the basement with bad CGI and washed up ’90s celebrities. To that end, today we have MEGA SHARK VS. CROCOSAURUS, the sequel to the previous year’s MEGA SHARK VS. GIANT OCTOPUS. If you’ll recall, I was furious at MEGA SHARK VS. GIANT OCTOPUS. I’m hoping this outing, directed by Christopher Ray (son of B-movie mogul Fred Olen Ray), will be better.

Spoilers ensue.

Diamond miners in central Africa awaken a gigantic (mile long) crocodile with their digging.

Meanwhile, the USS Gibson is cruising international waters.  Aboard is Lt. McCormick (Jaleel “Urkel” White, replacing Debbie Gibson), who is conducting experiments in using sound to repel sharks.  Unfortunately, the USS Gibson is attacked by the Megalodon from the previous movie.

The Croc is tracked down and tranquilized by hunter extraordinaire Nigel Putnam as a trophy, but revives when the Megalodon attacks the cargo ship he’s transporting the Croc on.

Lt. McCormick and Putnam are brought together (unwillingly; they have history and can’t stand each other) by Agent Hutchinson (Sarah Lieving, who has been in a lot of Asylum-made horror films over the past couple years) to hunt down these creatures — with neither believing that the other’s “pet monster” exists; Putnam doesn’t believe in the shark and McCormick doesn’t believe in the croc.  They’re soon quickly convinced of both monsters’ existence.

Realizing that both the Megalodon and the Crocosaurus are irresistibly attracted to the Crocosaurus’ eggs, they use them to bait a trap in the middle of the Panama Canal, in the hopes that the two monsters will kill each other off.  Unfortunately, it turns out that the Crocosaurus has laid hundreds of eggs, and now they’re all hatching.  Soon there are hundreds of Baby Crocosauruses, their mother, and the Megalodon all converging on Hawaii.  To make matters worse, the Megalodon has swallowed a nuclear submarine, and now has a reactor inside it.

The world’s last hope is to use McCormick’s gadget to lure all the creatures into the middle of the ocean, and detonate an undersea volcano to bury them in molten lava.  Simple, right?

THE END?

That was…marginally better than MEGA SHARK VS. GIANT OCTOPUS.  Not be a whole lot, though, to be honest.  There was less recycled special effects shots, I think, though there were still several obvious sequences where a special effects shot would simply be flipped and repeated.  The CGI is exactly what we’ve all come to expect from the Asylum and SyFy Channel Original Movies — in short, what for years now I’ve referred to as “Bulgarian-level CGI.”  No offense to any Bulgarians reading this, but a Bulgarian FX company did the CGI for the SyFy Channel Original Movie DEEP SHOCK, and it’s some of the worst I’ve ever seen.  Please do not feel that I’m slandering your country.

The plotline of MEGA SHARK VS. CROCOSAURUS was, in my opinion, overly complex and lacking in good narrative flow; the action jumped from location to location across the Atlantic and Pacific with little to no segue and oftentimes only the vaguest explanation of the fact that the action has changed location.

Final Analysis: A bit more creature action than MEGA SHARK VS. GIANT OCTOPUS, but overall dissatisfying.  Stick to the likes of MEGA PIRANHA for your Asylum Creature Feature viewing.

Overall, I give MEGA SHARK VS. CROCOSAURUS (2010)…

TWO BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

Greetings, reader. Let’s talk about someone whose name you should already know. A true pioneer of cinematic independence and DIY filmmaking, founder of the magazine Cinemagic back in the day (before it was sold to Starlog), a true prince of low-budget monster movies. I’m talkin’ ’bout Baltimore native Don Dohler (1946-2006). This man turned out some kickin’ sweet movies, such as NIGHTBEAST, GALAXY INVADER and today’s target, THE ALIEN FACTOR.  He even gave J.J. Abrams his first film job.  Sit down and get ready to have your mind blown by what this man made for less then what you’d pay to take a date to the movies these days.

Spoilers ensue.

Earth.  The sleepy town of Pine Hill.  We open on a young man and woman making out in a car (the man is Johnny Walker, who was a popular Baltimore-area DJ at the time this was made), when suddenly, a giant bug-monster attacks!

The sheriff is quickly on the scene — the girl’s in shock and the guy’s in pieces.  The mayor (Richard Dyszel, better known as horror host Count Gore De Vol) wants everything dealt with quickly and quietly, so that a deal for a multi-million dollar amusement park doesn’t fall through.  The sheriff is convinced the death is the result of a bear or bobcat attack, though local spunky girl reporter Edie is not convinced, and neither is Steve, the physician performing the autopsy on the dead guy.  The wound was inflicted by some sort of pincer or stinger, and there’s some sort of slimy substance around the puncture wound.

Soon, more deaths occur, as some of the dead guy’s friends go looking for the “bobcat” and run into the bug-monster (listed in the credits as the Inferbyce).  Additionally, a man leaving his house runs into some sort of glittering energy cloud that sucks the life out of him, aging his body tremendously and another man finds a nine foot tall hairy giant in his basement.

As the mayor and the sheriff argue over the correct course of action in dealing with these mysterious deaths, the enigmatic Benjamin Zachary shows up, claiming to be from a nearby observatory and explaining that a meteorite landed several days earlier in Pine Hill, and explaining that he intends to poke around and locate the meteorite.  The mayor gives Zachary a tour of the nearby area, where they discover a crashed spaceship and its dying pilot.  Zachary and the alien communicate telepathically for a moment, and then the dying alien warns him and the mayor to get back — the spaceship is about to explode!

During their brief communion, Zachary learned that three alien specimens, intended for an intergalactic zoo, were on board the spaceship and have escaped — the Inferbyce (the bug-like monster), the Zagatile (the tall furry creature), and a Leemoid (an energy creature that feeds on life-energy).

Zachary explains this to the mayor and sheriff, and that he has his own methods to deal with these creatures.  Edie and Steve are skeptical though, and set out to try and set the monsters on fire.  Unfortunately, the Inferbyce gives chase until Zachary kills it with concentrated sound-waves.

The mayor is killed by the Zagatile, and the sheriff nearly meets the same fate, before Zachary shoots it with a dart loaded with the Inferbyce’s venom.

Finally, there is just the Leemoid, a reptilian monster composed of pure energy, to be dealt with.  And interestingly, the sheriff has learned from the observatory that there is no Benjamin Zachary working there…he’s actually an alien sent to exterminate the monsters!

THE END?

Most movies are content to have one monster on the loose.  This movie has three — four, if you count the “skinless man” of Zachary’s true form.  It’s far from being a perfect film, but considering the shoestring budget, it’s a damned inventive and grandiose one.  The creature designs have a real “wow” factor to them, especially the Zagatile (which costumer creator John Cosentino basically performed on stilts) and the stop-motion Leemoid.

For those unfamiliar with movies like this, the low production values — Dohler’s basement acting as various locations throughout the film, some of the lighting and sound is a little wonky, etc. — can be a turn-off.  For me, though, it emphasizes what can be done with a little elbow grease and determination.  THE ALIEN FACTOR uses all the same special effects techniques that George Lucas and co. used to create the original Star Wars trilogy, but with a lot less funding, and some of the work looks just as good as what you saw in Star Wars, if not better.  The Zagatile is better and more alien than 90% of what you saw in the Mos Eisley Cantina.

Final Analysis: A wonderful DIY sci-fi monster movie.  If I had to voice a complaint, it’s the long sequence of a band in a bar playing — which was only included because the film was slightly below feature-length!

Overall, I give THE ALIEN FACTOR (1978)…

FOUR BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

Greetings, readers! Today, we have the culmination of a quest. I first saw an image of the monster from today’s film years ago, in a video segment interviewing Mike Vraney, of Something Weird Video. I immediately went on a hunt to try and identify the movie this strange, fork-tongued, big-headed monster was from, and eventually was able to trace it to 1962′s EL BARON DEL TERROR (released in the US as BRAINIAC). A little while later, I found a copy on Amazon for a reasonable price, ordered it and here we are.  I love it when a quest comes to fruition like this.  Anyways, on to the movie.

Spoilers ensue.

Mexico, 1661.  The Baron Vitellius (Abel Salazar, who as near as I can tell, appeared in a bunch of Mexican horror films) is being tried by the Spanish Inquisition for witchcraft, necromancy, adultery and a whole host of other unsavory crimes, and sentenced to torture and execution, burned at the stake.  As he dies, Vitellius swears he will return when the comet hanging in the sky above his pyre returns, and when he returns he will kill all the descendants of his torturers.

300 years later, in 1961, Baron Vitellius returns, dropped back on earth by the returning comet.  And what a sight he presents — bulging forehead, short horns, long pointed ears and nose, sucker-clawed hands and a long, forked tongue.  He drives this tongue into the back of his victim’s heads and sucks their brains out! After feeding, he reverts back a more normal human appearance.

He quickly begins a search for the descendants of his torturers, who conveniently all seem to live in the same city.  However, he’s not terribly careful about disguising his tracks — he throws a party and invites the various descendants, after which he begins to pick them off, seducing the women before murdering them with his tongue.  The police inspector, a big, bald, gruff guy, is suspicious of Vitellius, as are Reinaldo and Victoria, a pair of young married grad students working for a local astronomer.

But when Vitellius targets Victoria as the last descendant of his ultimate judge, can Reinaldo and the police inspector put an end to Vitellius’ reign of terror?

THE END!

That was a blast! I really need to watch more Mexican horror movies.  Abel Salazar not only starred in this film, he also produced it, as he did with many of his horror films — or should I say, of the films he produced, there’s only two he did not star in.  EL BARON DEL TERROR is probably his strangest film, with its dreamy, surrealistic tone and outrageously weird monster.  There’s very few non-kaiju monsters I can think of that come close to being this bizarre — the Mul in FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE SPACE MONSTER comes close.

These days, a lot of critics are quick to dismiss the “cheapness” of this film — for example, there are no actual exterior shots; everything that looks like exterior was actually shot in a studio using back-projection — but given the cost of back-projection vs. taking a thirty minute drive out into the countryside, I can’t help but suspect what’s being called “cheapness” is in fact “artistic license.”  And hey, the fact that people are still talking about this film, 50 years after it was made, says something about it’s power.

Final Analysis: An irresistibly weird piece of world cult cinema, this is a must-see for any psychotronic video fans.

Overall, I give BRAINIAC (1962)…

FIVE BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

It’s been a while since I’ve done a really recent movie, readers, so let’s see what Netflix Roulette brings us from 2010-2012…spin spin spin…THE LOST TRIBE…cast of complete unknowns except for Lance Henriksen, who is probably slumming…ah, what the Hell. Let’s give it a go.  It’s not like I watch these expecting them to be good.

Spoilers ensue.

Deep in the rain forest, an archaeological expedition uncovers a humanoid skull, albeit long and misshapen.  We then cut to the Vatican, where Lance Henriksen receives instructions to hunt down the young woman who uncovered the skull, being told, “She’ll lead you to the rest of the team.”

Next thing you know, a team of Special Forces-looking guys are chasing her through the night, and drive her straight into Lance Henriksen’s arms.  He starts interrogating her, and when she won’t answer shoots her in the leg! Then he shoots her in the face!

Anyone else confused already?

Fade out, fade in.

We’re on a boat with a bunch of boozing schlubs on a yacht to Malaysia, where they’re about to sign a vastly lucrative contract to handle broadband internet connectivity for Southeast Asia and China.  I get the feeling we’re not supposed to get too attached to these people, but in case you’re wondering, their names are Anna, Tom, Joe, Alexis and Chris.

They pick up a shipwrecked castaway, who fairly swiftly overrides the yacht’s autopilot and attempts to steer the boat in a new direction.  This results in him crashing the boat and sinking it.  Mr. Castaway-Hijacker is killed in the process, but the rest of the cast washes ashore on a deserted, uncharted island (do those even exist any more?).  They bury the dead guy and try to make contact with naval authorities via the yacht’s radio.

Soon, however, they discover something to be amiss.  Something dug up the dead guy and rifled through their makeshift shelter.  And further inland, they find a camp full of equipment marked with the name of a prominent Genetic Research firm.  And something is hiding in the trees, watching them with some sort of infrared monster-vision.

Tom wanders off for some alone time, and gets chomped by unseen assailants.  Alexis and Chris die very soon thereafter.  The survivors realize there’s some sort of monstrous tribe in the jungle, picking them off one by one.  The Genetic Research camp, upon further investigation, is revealed to be the camp from the beginning of the film, and examining a laptop reveals a video journal kept by the woman Lance Henriksen killed, explaining that they found evidence of a “missing link” that proves humanity evolved from apes, and expressing her fear that the Church is going to have her murdered in order to suppress this discovery.

THE HELL?

Lance Henriksen swiftly shows up, assuming these castaway schlubs are a rescue team sent in after the “missing” geneticists.  Will he realize his mistake, and will the Coast Guard show up in time to find survivors? Or will the Lost Tribe kill everyone?

THE END!

The Hell was that? Bullshit PREDATOR rip-off (straight down to the heroine getting covered in mud and discovering that this prevents the monsters from seeing her) with a side helping of bullshit DA VINCI CODE rip-off (the Catholic Church murdering to protect its secrets, really?) resulting in a great big heaping helping of bullshit.  To make it even more bullshit, this is a remake of a film made ONE YEAR EARLIER, called, variously, THE TRIBE, THE FORGOTTEN ONES or AFTER DUSK THEY COME, starring Jewel Staite, and featuring several of the same minor actors.

To make matters worse, you barely see the creatures at all.  This can be done very well, and give the movie a sense of menace.  Here, it really doesn’t work as well.  There’s quite a few scenes where, given the lighting, you should be able to see them, but they apparently generate their own shadows to hide in.  When you do see them, all I could think was of Chaka and the other Pakuni ape-men from LAND OF THE LOST.  Except, of course, for the “Alpha Male,” who is sporting Predator-esque dreadlocks and wears a Sabretooth Tiger (!?!) skull mask, because of course the Predator had a mask so this monster has to have one as well.

Final Analysis: If I ever try to own or recommend this film, punch me in the groin.

Overall, I give THE LOST TRIBE (2010)…

PARIS HILTON.

Greetings, readers, today Netflix has delivered unto us poor degenerates…TOXIC ZOMBIES, also known as BLOODEATERS and FOREST OF FEAR, banned in Britain during the Video Nasties scare of 1982 but finally released uncut in 2006. As a sad aside to this film, writer-director-star Charles McCrann left the film industry after making TOXIC ZOMBIES, became a businessman, and died in the September 11th attacks.  Well, now that our enthusiasm for this film has been completely harshed by that discovery, let’s take a look, shall we?

Spoilers ensue.

The film opens on a hippie girl bathing in the middle of the forest using a bucket of water and a wash-cloth.  As soon as she finishes, she’s gunned down in cold blood by federal officers, who raid her hippie friends’ camp.  The remaining hippies deal with the officers violently, and then make plans to harvest their marijuana as fast as possible and get out.

The agency, upon learning that their officers have disappeared, realize that this must be the locale where the hippies are growing marijuana.  They make plans to use an experimental herbicide, Dromax, to exterminate the dope crop.

Meet Forest Ranger Tom Cole (McCrann).  He normally makes quarterly tours of the area about to be doused in Dromax, but the agency sends him a telegram telling him NOT to make this quarter’s tour, though they won’t give him a valid reason why.  So, Cole heads up there anyways.

The hippies get doused with Dromax, since of course the agency, being an evil government agency, doesn’t care about a few hippies.  The herbicide, since it was never tested for effects on humans, turns the hippies into blood-thirsty mutant cannibal zombies!

So, in defiance of direct orders, Cole, his brother Jay, and his wife Polly head out for a weekend of camping and fishing.  Right in the middle of Toxic Zombie country.

You can see where this is going, right?

Cole and Polly (Jay bites the dust early on) find a couple children abandoned by their parents’ death, as well as a hermit in a natty sweater, and soon this group is trying to make their way down the mountain to safety.  But will Cole’s villainous superiors at the agency let him escape with his life?

THE END!

What the hell was with that soundtrack? It was like Brecht’s Threepenny Opera crossed with Carpenter’s HALLOWEEN score!

Being filmed in 1979, TOXIC ZOMBIES partakes heavily of the anti-government sentiment of the 1970s, with the sneering government bigwigs who douse people in untested chemicals being the real villains, rather than the anthropophagous zombies.  Not only do these government bigwigs start the problem by spraying Dromax across the landscape, they exacerbate the issue by lying to Cole, then make it even worse by effectively kidnapping his wife and him at gunpoint.  The undead are practically the frigging heroes here!

The zombie make-up is a treat in its simplicity — in this modern era of ultra-gory, drawn-skin, flesh falling off bones zombies, sometimes it’s nice to kick back with a film in which the zombies are people with gray facepaint, dark eye make-up, and a few latex sores.  The gore effects are very nicely handled, including an exceptional scene in which a hand is removed with a machete.  Movie blood always seems too watery to me, and the blood spraying here is no exception.  Maybe my own blood is just unusually thick and sluggish, so my baseline for comparison is off.

Final Analysis: Not fantastic, to be honest kind of a sluggish, slow-moving film.  Good gore, though, and kind of amusing conceptually.

Overall, I give TOXIC ZOMBIES (1980)…

TWO BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

Greetings readers.  The name Vincent Price should not be a strange one to readers here, as very few names can be given higher prominence in the realm of B-grade horror movies.  While Karloff and Lugosi are known primarily for their A-pictures, Price has always been an icon of camp.  Gourmet chef, art collector, and cheery ham, Price was a man of many talents, and not above taking a good-natured swipe at himself.  This film, 1973′s THEATRE OF BLOOD, is one such swipe.  Price plays a hammy actor who…well, let’s just see, shall we?

Spoilers ensue.

The Ides of March.  A prominent film critic and housing developer receives a call that a group of squatters have taken up residence in a building slated for demolition.  These alcoholic hobos swiftly stab him to death.  Enter Vincent Price, reciting Shakespeare — specifically, Julius Caesar.

Price here is Edward Lionheart, a Shakespearean actor — in his own eyes, the finest living actor of such things.  Fed up with the constant nattering and dismissal of his work by the critics, attempted suicide.  He survived, resuscitated by the drunken homeless, who now form his band of minions.  The world thinking he’s dead, Lionheart is now free to pursue vengeance against the critics who mocked him, and more importantly, denied him the fabulous Critic’s Choice Award.

The next victim is speared through the chest and dragged behind a horse in the style of Achilles in Troilus and Cressida.  The next, a critic’s wife is drugged to sleep soundly while her husband is mutilated in her bed next to her — she wakes up to his decapitated corpse a la Cymbeline.  The next, a noted lecher, has his heart torn out as Shylock’s “pound of flesh” in The Merchant of Venice .

The remaining critics quickly band together against whatever maniac is killing them; slowly it dawns on them that Edward Lionheart is not dead; and his daughter, Edwina (Diana Rigg), is helping him.

The deaths continue apace; an alcoholic is drowned in a vat of wine, a la the Duke of Clarence in Richard III.  Lionheart duels with his chief critic, Peregrine Devlin, in the style of Tybalt and Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, though as he intends to kill Devlin last, spares him and urges him to spread the word of his return.  The next critic is led to believe his wife has been unfaithful (shades of Othello) and smothers her, only to be caught and sentenced for her murder and sentenced to life in prison.  The next, female critic Ms. Moon (played by Price’s soon to be third wife Coral Browne) is electrocuted with her own hair curlers as Lionheart (wearing an afro wig and pretending to be flamboyantly gay as part of his disguise as a hairdresser) recites Henry VI, Part I, the bit about Joan of Arc being burned at the stake.

In what is probably the high point of the film, critic Meredith Merridew, a gluttonous weirdo who carries his poodles everywhere, is tricked into eating a pie made from those very poodles — once Lionheart reveals the secret ingredient, he begins cramming pie into this fat critic’s mouth until he chokes on it.  This, of course, mirrors Titus Andronicus, wherein Queen Tamora is made to eat a pie containing her children; Merridew considers his “doggie-woggies” his “babies.”

Price having been both an actor and a gourmet chef, I can’t even begin to imagine how much fun he had with this scene.

Finally, Lionheart has Devlin locked into a machine designed to drive a pair of dagger into his eyes, a la King Lear, should Devlin not recant his prior selection of an inferior actor for the Critic’s Choice Award, and deliver it instead to Lionheart.

The police closing in, Devlin freed, Lionheart sets fire to the theatre in which he’s been hiding and flees to the roof where he finally perishes.  The closing line of the film, Devlin critiques Lionheart’s entire murderous scheme: “A remarkable performace. He was overacting as usual, but he knew how to make an exit.”

THE END!

That…was surprisingly similar to THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES, released two years earlier.  This is in no way a knock against THEATRE OF BLOOD; it was just unexpected for the films to parallel one another so closely.  In both cases, Price’s character is presumed dead, thus freeing him to pursue a course of revenge against a group of individuals he blames for another demise (in PHIBES, that of his wife on the operating table; in BLOOD, his acting career), bumping them off one at a time in various creative and ingenious fashions each following a specific theme (the Plagues of Exodus and the Plays of Shakespeare, in the order Lionheart performed them) while the police are powerless to stop him.

The difference being that while the Phibes role required Price to emote almost solely with body language, as Edward Lionheart Price is allowed to ham it up and play the bombastic Shakespearean drama queen.  And the costumes! Every murder required its own wardrobe.  I think Price’s performance as “Butch,” the flamboyantly femme afro-crowned hairdresser was so campy that it would have made John Waters’ mustache curl.

Final Analysis: While in THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES, one never gets the sense that the surgeons were somehow negligent or malicious in Victoria Phibes’ death, here the critics are such hideously unpleasant human beings — one even at one point comments that it’s difficult not to resent an actor that draws a bad review — that you root for Vincent Price louder and harder than ever before.  You can’t wait to see what he does to each and every one of these deserving victims.  Not a perfect film, but an extremely enjoyable one.

Overall, I give THEATRE OF BLOOD (1973)…

FIVE BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

Greetings, readers. It’s cold, it’s been raining for about 36 hours nonstop, so I might as well relax here on the couch and watch more movies. This film, a Poverty Row-cheapie starring Bela Lugosi and John Carradine, has no actual relation to the previous year’s Lugosi vehicle THE APE MAN, but is named thus to hopefully capitalize on the handful of people at the time who enjoyed THE APE MAN. Kind of like how TROLL 2 is completely and utterly unrelated to TROLL, only here the two unrelated films share an actor.  Oh well.

Spoilers ensue.

Meet Drs. Dexter (Lugosi) and Gilmore (Carradine).  They’ve kidnapped a local derelict, Willie the Weasel, for nefarious experiments.  They froze him solid for four months, then thawed him out and revived him with an injection.  Suspended animation has been a pet theory of Dr. Dexter’s, and now he’s proven that it can be done.  And, as he says, if he can revive a man frozen for four months, he can revive one frozen for four years…or four hundred years!

Next thing you know, Dexter and Gilmore are on an expedition into the Arctic, searching for examples of prehistoric man frozen solid in ice.  Miraculously, the find one and bring him back to New york.  Before long, they have him thawed and revived.  Their unfrozen caveman proves hostile, and with the aid of a blowtorch Dexter forces him into a cage.

Dexter explains his ultimate plan to Gilmore — he intends to implant a portion of modern human brain into the caveman’s skull, endowing him with the power of speech and a small modicum of reason, enabling the caveman to follow orders given by Dexter.  For this purpose, Dexter drugs and kidnaps Steve, the fiance of Gilmore’s niece Ann.  Gilmore is not particularly pleased by this development.

Gilmore severs ties with Dexter, but Dexter isn’t through yet.  Unfortunately, before he can further his plans, the caveman (remember him?) breaks loose.  Dexter uses this to lure Gilmore back to the lab, where he traps him, paralyzing him with electricity long enough to tie him up.  He’s decided to use Gilmore’s brain to advance the caveman!

Cave-Gilmore soon breaks free, trying to make contact with Ann and Steve.  But can the sliver of Gilmore control the caveman’s murderous impulses?

THE END!

Wow, that was…kind of middle of the road, actually.  Surprisingly, for a film only an hour long, I found the ending to be surprisingly drawn out, even excessively so.  On the flip side of the equation, we have Bela Lugosi chewing up scenery like it’s good old-fashioned Hungarian Goulash, while John Carradine is fairly subdued in the initially-more-heroic role.

As an aside, does anyone else get weirded out when Lugosi is playing mad scientists with normal names? I’m so used to him having a name like Vornoff, Zabor, Zorka, Werdegast, Orloff, Mirakle that when I see him playing a character named Dexter or Brewster it seems out of place.

Interestingly enough, the credits list both George Zucco and Frank Moran as playing the “ape man,” but I’m fairly certain only one of them did, and while it’s a little difficult to tell behind the fright-wig and beard, I don’t think that’s actually George Zucco in the ape-man costume.

Final Analysis: At only an hour long, RETURN OF THE APE MAN still manages to overstay it’s welcome a little bit, but it is an enjoyable film.

Overall, I give RETURN OF THE APE MAN (1944)…

THREE BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.

Greetings, readers, Bill here with a modified version of Netflix Roulette.  I’ve been watching a lot of movies from the 1960s-on, especially the 1980s.  It’s been far too long since I’ve dug up something from the 1950s or earlier, so let’s do that.  Going through my Netflix queue…80s…80s…80s…70s…80s…2000s…come on…BINGO, GIANT FROM THE UNKNOWN, 1958! Let’s take a look, shall we?

Spoilers ensue.

Welcome to Pine Ridge, California.  Something strange has been happening in the vicinity of nearby Devil’s Crag lately — animals are being torn apart, and now human beings as well.  Some of the local old-timers claim this is the result of a curse — local drunk Indian Joe (stereotypical drunken Indian of the period) claims it’s the work of Indian Spirits, who are avenging themselves on the White Man.  Sheriff Parker is skeptical of supernatural, but acknowledges that something funny is going on.  His immediate suspect is Wayne Brooks, a local drifter who’s had some troubles with the man who’d been killed.

Into town rolls Professor Cleveland (B-movie veteran Morris Ankrum) and his daughter Janet (Sally Fraser, who’s been in IT CONQUERED THE WORLD, WAR OF THE COLOSSAL BEAST and EARTH VS. THE SPIDER).  Wayne Brooks had attended some of Professor Cleveland’s lectures at the university, and they soon become fast friends.  Professor Cleveland and his daughter are heading into the mountains for some archaeological research, and Wayne joins them.

Professor Cleveland explains what he’s come to the area to look for — he’s preparing a definitive history of a conquistador who’d explored the area, and is looking for evidence of Vargas, the Devil-Giant — a brutal man who’d led a band of renegades in search of Indian gold, and disappeared without a trace.  Wayne is something of an archaeologist himself, and has made some interesting discoveries in the area of Devil’s Crag — not the least of which was a prehistoric lizard, preserved alive inside a rock.

Heading up into Devil’s Crag, our trio of adventurers have nasty run-ins with Sheriff Parker and Indian Joe, but are undeterred and begin examining the area of Devil’s Crag with a metal detector — the theory being that Spanish relics, being made of metal, will register, while stone Indian artifacts will not.  After a couple days of disappointment, Professor Cleveland is ready to give in to his daughter’s request that they give up.

One last sweep with the metal detector, though, turns up…a collection of Spanish armor and weapons, where Vargas’ renegade expedition was killed and buried by Indians 500 years earlier.  Wait a minute…1958 minus 500…how were there Spanish Conquistadors in California in 1458, almost 40 years before Columbus showed up thinking he’d found India? I think they meant 400 years.

A lightning strike in the midst of their campsite not only uncovers Vargas himself, but reanimates his perfectly preserved corpse! This giant brute (actor Buddy Baer stood 6’6″) soon grabs his armor from the campsite and is quickly back to his vicious old ways.  After Vargas kills the one pretty girl in town, Sheriff Parker comes to arrest Wayne for the crime.  By this time, Vargas has also kidnapped Janet.  Can Wayne break out of handcuffs, rescue Janet and send Vargas back to the grave?

THE END!

That was a fun little film, and one of the earliest directorial efforts of Richard Cunha, who also directed such classics as SHE DEMONS, MISSILE TO THE MOON and FRANKENSTEIN’S DAUGHTER.  This is perhaps one of his most polished films, made using the full force of the contacts Cunha had previously made in Hollywood and through the US Army Air Corps during WWII, where he’d served as a combat photographer.

Among the talent tapped to work on this film was Jack Pierce, who’d previously worked on such Universal classics as FRANKENSTEIN, THE MUMMY and THE WOLF MAN, creating the iconic images of the classic Universal monsters.  By this point, he was largely forgotten by Universal Studios, but it’s a treat to see that he was still working.

Vargas himself is impressive, though essentially Frankensteinian — his face has more lines than Danny Trejo’s, and he’s presented as little-to-nothing more than a lumbering brute who swings an axe and throws rocks.  He’s far too animated and active to be written off as just “a zombie,” but at the same time there’s clearly been some brain damage done during his state of suspended animation.

Final Analysis: A fun little monster movie with some good slow-building mystery in the beginning.  And hey — they never did resolve that plot point of something killing animals and people! The killer is still on the loose!

Overall, I give GIANT FROM THE UNKNOWN (1958)…

FOUR BARRELS OF TOXIC WASTE.