Going To Pieces: The Rise And Fall Of the Slasher Film (Another Documentary)

Score: 7 Out Of 10

           This past week a reader gave me a DVD to watch. It turned out to be a documentary about slasher films and being one who almost never turns down a slasher film (regardless if it is good or bad), I decided I would not mind watching a movie about slasher films. "Going To Pieces: The Rise And Fall Of The Slasher Film" was made in 2006 (it was based on the book of the same title published in 2002) and features interviews with Tom Savini, Wes Craven, Rob Zombie, Debra Hill, John Carpenter and Betsy Palmer (believe it or not, she did make a pretty good contribution to the genre). For the most part, this was a pretty good flick. It was entertaining, insightful and because I watched it on  DVD they got to show all the gore and nudity that made a lot of us fall in love with these movies when we were kids (you know, back before we knew anything about plot... or good dialogue... or good acting). The downside of this is I had to relive the final scene of "Sleepaway Camp," which was exactly as disturbing as I remember it. Someone in the film (I do not remember who) also pointed out that "The Crying Game" might have ripped that movie off. I will not debate that here (they did).

         So not bad for a documentary. The only gripe I could really come up with for this film was if you are a huge fan of slasher films or a horror movie buff, you are really not going to get anything out of this movie. It has it's moments where you might go, "Oh, I didn't know that," or "So that's how they did that," but even those moments are not terribly exciting. The film does touch on the protests that coincided with the release of certain horror films and parents outrage over other films, but even here the film does little to give a fresh opinion or some thoughts that all of us haven't had at one point or another. The final statement: If you are new to the genre and want to catch up, this just might be your movie. If you are a fan and looking for some deep thoughts on horror movies from the late 70's to the mid 80's, you might want to pass.

Love,
   The B-Movie Guy

Twitter: @BMovieguy     #BMovieblog   #Goingtopieces

Hexen Bis Aufs Blut Gequält (Mark Of The Devil)

Score: 6 Out Of 10 

           The picture to the left proclaims this to be "the most horrifying film ever made," and that might have been true in 1970, but by todays standards, I think it is actually pretty tame. Some people get burned alive, a few people get caned or whipped and one poor girl gets her tongue yanked out. Most amusing of all the torture was a guy being forced to sit in a large wooden chair while a fire is lit underneath him. The film takes place during the sixteenth century in germany and focuses on the real life early European wich hunts. I do not know how much of the film is accurate or how much of it is exagerated (I am willing to bet quite a bit is exaggerated), but over all the story is pretty good. The story focuses on the church using religion and fear to steal peoples land and possessions and rape and torture big brested women. One of the people working for the church begins to suspect wrong doings and starts to rebell.

          "Mark Of The Devil" was directed by Michael Armstrong and stars Herbert Lom, Udo Kier and Olivera Katarina. The acting here is pretty solid, especially on the part of Kier (but when does Udo Kier ever putting up a bad performance? Answer: NEVER!). I am used to seeing movies where you have the worst actors and actresses and Kier just

giving stellar performances, but this was not the case with this film. Everybody shows off some pretty good acting chops. The main problems with this film were not so great dialogue and the lack of real gore. Admittedly I am pretty decensitized but I do not believe that the average film fan is that much less decesnsitized than I. Most of the violence is mainly just blood splatter. A few people are dissmembered but the camera cuts away before you really see anything. A couple people get burned alive, but it just looks like dummies being tossed on fires.

                     On the positive side, it did keep me somewhat enter tained for about ninety minutes, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much. I should also mention that there were some rapes in there too. In fact, in hindsight I guess this could almost be considered an exploitaion film.

Love,
          The B-Movie Guy


Twitter: @BMovieguy   #BMovieblog   #Markofthedevil

Bloody Birthday (Way Cooler Than My Parties Ever Were)

Score: 6 Out Of 10

       In 1974, "Black Christmas" was released. Most horror fans are in agreeance that this is the film that started the "slasher" sub-genre of horror films (although I swear I've seen films that date as far back as the early 1930's that share in the same formula as "Black Christmas", this is just the first to experience any kind of popularity) and since it's release there have have been countless other films added to that sub-genre. Over the years I have seen horror movie psychos (both human and supernatural) mow down a seemingly endless parade of naked and semi-clothed teenagers. But I have to admit, I think this one actually showed me something new. The ruthless killer that beats, strangles and shoots it's victims to death is really just three young kids (they look to be about 11 or 12). The film stars Lori Lethin, Melinda Cordell and Julie Brown. It was written and directed by Ed Hunt.

       The plot is simple enough. Three kids who share the same birthday decide to celebrate it by killing their teachers, classmates and parents and seem to really have fun with it all the way through the movie. This movie, despite the fact that it's antagonists are children, still delivers on all the nudity and violence we've come to expect from 1980's slasher films over the years, so if sex and violence is your thing don't rule this movie out. The writing isn't bad, it could have been better, but what really sells you here is the acting. It was very easy for me to buy into really hating these kids, which in hind sight makes me sad because I really like kids. All in all, I'm gonna say this was a really entertaining film. There were some unintentional laughs but over all it was pretty good.

Love,
  The B-movie Guy

Twitter: @BMovieguy   #Bmovieblog   #Bloodybirthday

P.s.
I hope my kid doesn't turn out like this.

The Immortalizer (So Bad You Probably Shouldn't Even Read A Review)

Score: 3 Out Of 10

          Every time I think I find the worst movie ever I prove Myself wrong. "The Immortalizer" is so bad that I even have a hard time trying to find information about it online. It's almost as if the entire world has acknowledged how bad it is and decided to just forget it. After watching it I can't say I blame anyone for wanting to forget it. It was directed by Joel Bender (any "Power Ranger" fans out there should recognize that name) and stars Ron Ray, Chris Crone and Clarke Lindsey. None of these people do a good job on this film and all should feel ashamed of it. I hope the memory of this movie haunts their dreams at night. I feel really bad giving this film a bad review. The reason is because I almost always love 80's horror movies. This was the decade that really brought some memorable scares, a lot of which are mentioned on the "B-Movie Bucket List," by the way, but this one just makes the entire decade look bad.

          The plot is as simple as it is boring. A mad doctor kidnaps young people so old people will pay him to put their brains in the younger bodies. That's it. How they managed to get more than an hour out of that plot is beyond me, but somehow they managed to drag it out to about an hour and a half. When I say drag, by the way, I really mean DRAG. This movie was so unbelievably boring I had a hard time sitting through it. I made it about half way then I pulled out the iPad and started reading the IMDB page for it. That led me to the IMDB page for "Power Rangers" and, I'm not kidding when I say this, I got way more interested reading the trivia section for "Power Rangers" than I did actually watching the movie. Do yourself a favor, if you feel like watching this movie, instead click the link for "MMPR" and read the trivia section instead. It's WAY more interesting.


Love,
  The B-Movie Guy.


 Twitter: @BMovieguy   #Bmovieblog   #Theimmortalizer

The Slumber Party Massacre (Naked Women And A Serial Killer, It Must Be The 80's.)

Score: 4 Out Of 10

            A few weeks ago I blogged about a film produced by Roger Corman and when looking for something to watch this week, I saw his name and thought, "Why not?" Excuse me, Mr. Corman? Hi. I know you're a legendary producer and are responsible for one of my favorite movies, but could you please give me back the last 77 mins. of my life. Thanks. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I didn't enjoy all the lovely naked women who appeared in this horror comedy, but the fact of the matter remains. I did not laugh and I am not feeling to frightened. So as a horror comedy I will have to say this one is a fail. "The Slumber Party Massacre (witch spawned two sequels by the way... I know, right... Two... A trilogy!)" stars Michelle Michaels, Robin Stille and Michael Villella. It was directed by Amy Holden Jones. I'm not joking when I say this, she also Directed the "Beethoven" films. Remember those? The cute dog movies where the family falls in love with the Saint Bernard. Apparently it only took ten years to go from drilling naked teenagers (pun) to family dog movies.


                       Alright, let's get down to why this movie stunk. The main problem: It's a horror COMEDY. So why wasn't I laughing? Answer: Because they followed the "Corman Philosophy" of film making. Fill it full of blood and boobies and hope horny teenagers pay to see it. But overall it even fails in that respect. Most of the nudity is right up front. After thirty minutes all you're left with is a fully clothed (with one quick exception), unfunny and flat out predictable horror film. They even had a cat jump out and scare the main character. If you really want to have fun with this movie, invite some friends over, get some alcohol going and you guys can take shots every time someone notices a cliche. Or you could just watch a good movie.

     Love,
       The B-Movie Guy.

Twitter: @BMovieguy  #Bmovieblog   #theslumberpartymassacre

Witchslayer: Gretl (WHAT THE HELL IS THE REAL NAME OF THIS MOVIE?!)

Score: 2 Out Of 10

       Holy Balls, this was bad! My first post was in regards to a film called "Slaughtered Vomit Dolls." That movie was so bad I honestly thought that nothing could have been worse. Luckily the SyFy channel was able to prove me wrong. This (made for T.V. SyFy channel original) movie stars Paul McGillin, Jefferson Brown and Shannen Doherty. The plot is simple; a grown up Hansel has become a (not so badass)witch hunter and is soon disturbed to find that his sister's body is now inhabited by the head witch. There are some subplots in there but all of them are pretty lame. Boring plots aside, there are so many things wrong with this movie that it's almost a crime. It suffers from bad acting, writing, dialogue, special effects, directing and sets. In order to prove a point, I will address these individualy.

Acting: The setting is supposed to be Germany. Would it kill them to have at least one person speak with a German accent?

Writing: The plot and sub-plots together make it feel like the story was written originaly for a video game, but then they changed there minds and mad a movie instead.

Dialogue: It's a period piece, they should at least talk like it's the mid eighteen hundreds.

Special Effects: The CGI in this one is so bad it's... well... it looks like every other SyFy channel original. So yeah... pretty bad.

Directing: Was there a director? If so IMDB doesn't seem to know he exists and neither do the actors.

Sets: With a few exceptions, the entire film looks like it was shot in a small patch of woods in New England.      

              I guess I shouldn't get too upset. Given the history of SyFy channel orignal films I should have known what I was getting into, but when you write a blog about bad movies it only stands too reason that sooner or later you will find yourself writing about something on the SyFy channel. That being said, what really dissapoints me is Shannen Doherty. Her acting in this was terrible. This movie is an example of why I belive she will be doomed to T.V.  and not theatrical films for the remainder of her career (including commercials that run during day time talk shows). That's upsetting because she used to be not bad as an actress. If you missed the premier and you see it coming up again on the program guide or maybe on demand and decide that you need to get your Doherty fix (I can't imagine why you would need a Doherty fix), do yourself a favor, Watch "Mall Rats" instead.


Love,
The B-Movie Guy

Twitter: @BMovieguy   #Bmovieblog   #Gretlwitchhunter

P.S.
Serously, if you go on the internet looking for this film, be warned, it has two or three differnt titles!

Monster (Humanoids From The Deep)

Score: 6 Out Of 10

           I feel like I find myself dealing with the subject of rape on this blog so much that I'm actually starting to feel bad about it. I mean, what if some sick-o reads this and starts raping women. On second thought, that would imply that people actually read this shit. Anyway, today I watched "Humanoids From The Deep (the opening titles in the movie refer to the film as Monster with the humanoids part in really really tiny print underneath, by the way)." This is film about sea monsters who come up on land for the purpose of mating with human women. Before we go any further, I would like to point out that the director, Barbara Peeters, wanted to make a darker and more serious horror film and was fired before completing the film by the producer, Roger Corman, for not filming enough nudity. There's two ways of looking at this. 1) Good for you Ms. Peeters, you stood up for what you believed in. 2) Good for you Mr. Corman, you gave us more titties. I haven't made up which side of the fence I'm on yet.

            So, our movie stars Doug McClure (you might remember him from some other shitty movies like: "The Land That Time Forgot" and "The Bananas Boat"), Ann Turkel and Vic Morrow. They all give terrible laughable performances. In all honesty, I actually kind of liked this film. It was really nothing more than cheesy monster costumes, boobies and lots of blood. Sure the movie is light on story, the effects looked bad, some of the characters did thing for seemingly no reason and all the dogs getting killed kinda upset me, but when you read the description for a movie on Netflix like this one has, you just no it's not really gonna be that good. Needless to say the reason I enjoyed this one was because I had low expectations. Sometimes you want a really good movie, sometimes you just want blood and boobies. This was a blood and boobies night.

Love,
   The B-Movie Guy

Twitter: @BMovieguy   #bmovieblog   #Humanoidsfromthedeep

P.S.
How the hell did this get four and a half stars on Netflix?!