A movie can lose it's way, rambling on for eternity till the cast, crew, director, and audience just in one way or another (either the film ending or mass suicide) wants the horror to end (horror as in nails on a chalkboard or mind splitting headaches, not the blood and guts we want to see). Seems like, they only wrote the first twenty or so minutes then winged the rest without regard for anything in the first part of the film. Ozploitation films are awesome in their own retarded redheaded incest baby with extra fingers, Michael Berryman lookalike, short bus kid of the future, kind of way. The director, Daniel Armstrong, coined his own term 'Neo Pulp', which he should spend more time in script development and less time on trying to make 'Neo Pulp' happen.
In all fairness, the first twenty minutes are really good. Evil unicorn, bad-ass celestial virgin, kung fu monks, cute actress getting dumped on, drunken ex-boyfriend damnation party all at a fast clip. Then the brick wall, hear the brakes, tires screeching, loud crash of metal and an explosion. The movie till the end is small skits and random acts, with the cute actress looking like an alcoholic trailer trash housewife who hasn't showered in a week. It really seemed that they were trying to film Daisy Masterman (Oscar) in the most unflattering ways possible. Didn't help she seemed to be taking on and off her push up bra between scenes.
Low budget movies can be great, this one is not. Rule one when working with a minimal budget or less than spectacular special effects, Less is more! Think Jaws (1975) or Terminator (1984) the shark is seldom seen as is Arnold cutting out his eye. Everything is implied and creative angles. This movie is like a bad old slow magician where the audience can tell how the trick is performed. Close up, long shots, with good lighting, doesn't make anything scary. The evil unicorn becomes less scary and more weird as the movie rolls. Bluecifer, the public artwork outside of DIA, is scarier than the unicorn. And the classic 80's toy Boglins is way scarier than the weird ball with eyes that came out of nowhere for one scene.
Bluesifer
Boglin
Apologetically a fan of The Evil Dead (1981) with many Deadesque nods. But these guys learned nothing from watching the Evil Dead. Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi have talked about the market research they did, finding once the action starts it can't stop. But also the evil/terror/monster has to have rules. In this film, things are just happening randomly, not connected seemingly to anything else. The whole movie is random characters dying and coming back to life. The whole second and third act are sorely missing motivation for the main character, leaving Oscar to do her worst Ash impression.
If you happen to be in the dark corners of the interweb, where light is the enemy and lemon parties happen, and you happen to come across 'Tarnation' or aka 'Cabin of the Damned' or 'Die Damonen Sind Los' only watch the first twenty minutes. Mister fast forward button does nothing after this mark.
Another movie that critics hated (prerequisite for a lot of films I like) and gets undue hate from horror aficionados. There is many issues in continuity and ability of a mentally challenged deformed man-child. The beginning of the film just simply confused people and didn't make a lot of sense. First Jason never died, second, he learns to use the phone and walk into the city unnoticed and stalk the lone survivor from the first film all while looking like the villain from The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976)? The first moments of a film normally set the tone for the rest of the film. This opening could have been left DOA on the editing room floor. Making a better film.
When half the camp decides to go to the bar leaving easy pickings for our murderer savant. The bar strangely looks like the one from Porky's (1981). The first killing is a tad weird with the psycho just hanging out with his arms wrapped around a large tree holding a garrotte waiting for someone to stop by close enough to get the wire over their head. And the spearing death paying homage to Bay of Blood (1971) was almost completely cut out due to gore and nudity. The film seems to have been filmed in order. Explaining why it gets better as it unfolds. With a first-time director Miner seemingly hitting his stride towards the end.
Ms. Voorhees was already established as batshit crazy. But knowing Jason was alive the entire time smears guano all over her face and has her dancing in the moonlight naked in front of her son kind of crazy. It helps show how crazy she was and opens a reasonable explanation to the opening. A schizophrenia split personality that happened when she thought Jason died. She later found him in the woods alive but the mental break already incurred. So Jason was raised in seclusion by a person who bounced back and forth thinking he should be dead and the loving mother. Talk about a rough childhood. This scenario makes the film that much more twisted. With the stalking and murder of Alice being done by a copycat.
Everyone thought the resurrection of Jason was a bad idea. The director, Tom Savili (makeup), and most of the people involved with the first one left. So in steps Steve Miner, an assistant on the first one, who ends up having a long successful career in Hollywood cranking out movies like House (1985), Lake Placid (1999) and Day of the Dead (2008). Initially Paramount wanted the rights to make a reoccurring series of horror films with a different non-continuing story (John Carpenter envisioned the same for Halloween) but the only way they could get the rights was to make a film centered around Jason. Which no one thought made any sense!
The MPAA played a big part in the toned down special effects. They were heavily criticized in giving the first one an R rating. So blood and guts were noticeably absent from this outing. But having naked girls wasn't taboo yet. Sheena (1984) had Tonya Roberts naked washing in a river during the whole opening credits, rated PG. But the problem with the T&A was the actress they hired to provide most of the T&A ended up being underage.
Part 2 is also the first outing for Frank Mancuso Jr. who became the showrunner for the series. Who went ahead creating the horrible tv show. That had nothing to do with the film or horror genre. It was a boring tedious labor of excruciating pain to watch. Think Supernatural (2005) without any humor, script, babes, monsters, wit or charm. The show did gain a cult following simply by having the name. But for some reason Jason's Nightmares (1988-1990) which was an awesome show, no one has ever seen. Friday the 13th: The Series (1987-1990) people kept tuning in waiting for Jason to kill all these boring people.
Worth noting everyone got over Jason being alive. The 3rd film released one year later did much better. The 3rd Friday introduced the hockey mask (that's right the first movie Jason was a tragic dead kid (not the villain), the second movie he didn't have his signature hockey mask (a burlap sack that made him look like the Elephant Man). The 3rd movie also had Richard Booker as Jason which cast a more sinister presence due to size. Another issue with this movie is Jason isn't very scary. Not in size or how he kills. Miner seemingly made an anti-Halloween (1978) movie with no suspense or build up.
This is another good example of a movie that time has been kind to. No one now finds it weird Jason is the killer or alive. Where Jason has now morphed this supernatural undead boogie man the opening scene isn't so awkward (you know after killing half of Manhattan and leaving a trail of floating blood bubbles in outer space). Miner's zippy movie pace makes it easier for today's audiences to watch compared to Halloween (1978). Amy Steel provides a good performance. Miner moves the film along at a brisk pace. The psychological aspect of the film plays better to audiences used to smarter films. Even the smaller Jason plays better in a day that most action stars and villains are no longer muscle-bound He-Men. Definitely worth a look or second viewing.
Safe to say after the 2008 remake there was little demand for this update of the Romero classic. Just like the Bay Watch movie, there is no demand for this. Remakes very rarely capture all the ingredients that made the original so good. Either it needs to refocus the story, have new twists, or better special effects, generally better overall. Hopefully all the above. Rarely does a remake get a Director with vision, that can pull off a Zombie's Halloween type of, didn't know how much better it could be, movie!
The 1985 original was gritty, violent, all hope was lost theme. Miguel suffered from PTSD along with deeply questioning his faith was just ready to die, representing, depressingly, the middle ground. The military just wanted to survive without hope by closing themselves off. And the civilians who had hope, either for a cure or to find an unpopulated island. The real threat was from people themselves, not the zombies. The last few people on earth had little reason to play nice with each other, even though their lives depended on it. Romero gave up half the budget just so he could make his unrated version.
Bloodlines just starts-out bad. The opening montage comes off cheesy. From crazy amounts of over spay from bites to zombies going right through plate-glass and car windows. A zombie breaks through a narrow plate-glass window to snatch a girl riding past on her bike. Since the zombie couldn't be able to see her beforehand or normally break through glass like that, it just set the tone for the movie. There never is any tension built up. No characters to get emotionally attached to. Not to mention one static camera shot after another and cardboard characters. Dr. Logan is gone from this retelling, who is key to justifying Rhodes outrage and unraveling. Bloodline had a different take on Bub that was interesting for a sec. But had a weird Heath Ledger Joker look.......
The original made thirty-four million on a budget of three point five million. The 2008 knockoff did three hundred thousand on a generous budget of eighteen million. Bloodline has a budget of eight million and should make less than the 2008 version. It's just that bad. Horror fans aren't hard to please. Some gore, some boobies, some characters you really want to die horribly, some cheesy one-liners. See the classic Romero 1985 film, in all it's brutal gory. The zombie gore-father delivers!
I know most people once they realize this is a review for a documentary will stop reading immediately and go back to watching cat videos on YouTube. Many remember National Lampoon (NL) as the raunchy, little substance, dirty magazine that was kept under the counter that you had to ask for along with what nudy mag you wanted. But for a shiny brief moment in the mid 70's, Everyone read National Lampoon! A toilet bowl of counterculture, drugs, booze, frat boys, humor that was far from good taste, and scantily clad women (AKA nude) that was written at a level for a juvenile Einstein that spewed out satire of everything mainstream and mundane.
We all know the two big Lampoon movies Animal House and Vacation, but most people don't know is how big Lampoon was and how far it reached into pop culture. With meteoric success the most talented people were begging to be let into the bathroom to party with these guys. All those famous skits that John Belushi and Chevy Chase did on SNL they were doing them first on The National Lampoon Radio Hour and Off-Broadway Lemmings for Lampoon. No conversation about Caddyshack (1980) happens without mentioning SNL but all the main writers, director, cast, and producers all met while working at National Lampoon. SNL basically made everyone that worked at Lampoon an offer they couldn't refuse. Some of the most iconic movies came from the creative talent that learned how to get high at Lampoon. Ghostbusters (1984) starred two Alumni Harold Ramis and Bill 'Fricking' Murray. John Hughes who came to define 80's teen movies started as a writer at NL. NL was a dirty little toilet bowl that sucked some of the most talented people at the time down into its chaos.
So what happened? Like many Phoenix's that rose to fame in a quick time NL came crashing down in bad business practices, drugs, personal squabbles and burn out. When Doug Kenney and Henry Beard started NL they had a forced buy-out in five years. Matty Simmons (the money) never thought they would actually walk away from the baby they started. In reality, they were killing themselves to make the magazine a success working long hours and doing most of the heavy lifting. When the five year mark hit they took their briefcase of money and walked out the door with a certain finger waving in the air. Leaving NL without it's key writers, editors, and visionaries. It was around the same time that SNL came calling and stole all the performers (of course NL originally stole them from Second City). John Belushi was a seriously dedicated artist at this time also crazy talented. But no one tried to sign him to a contract. Well someone did, SNL did. The contributors they had, there was no attempt to keep them. MAD Magazine had contributors all across the country working remotely. Each year those that hit the required number of articles went on an all expense paid trip. Which became a big deal. MAD had some really talented people for sometimes forty years working for them. The death-blow was bad licensing deals and the decision to include more nudity, which they couldn't afford good models, that ended up getting the mag a permanent home under the counter of stores. Matty eventually became Editor-in-Chief, appointing his two sons as editors. So what started out as drunk college frat boys making fun of their parent's mundane lives and showing others how to lead a debaucherous lifestyle, became ran by a serious grandfather and his obedient mid-aged sons, nuff said.
Like so many huge successes a lot of it was luck. Gathering a very talented cast of people at a time where the public was very excepting of their brand of humor and satire. And Animal House was no different. The script was very thin, more of a general outline of a movie. Most of the movie was ad-libbed. It didn't hurt to have a talented cast. Everyone was very focused on making the opportunity count. A bunch of hard partying people go off without a script to make a movie, there's no way it should have been any good, let alone great. They got lucky, but instead of learning what to do in the future that formula was a relied on blueprint for future movies. Between Animal House and Vacation, they had a couple of bombs. Movies so bad they don't have an IMDB page even though big names were in them. Even Caddyshack was a mess. The movie was to focus the story on young caddys. But with ad-libbing, the legends quickly took over. Billy Murray, Chevy Chase, Roddy Dangerfield were all great. And even the groundhog was only added as an afterthought in post-production. At the time the movie was considered a failure.
It's sad so many talented people didn't live very long after NL. The world was definitely robbed of very talented people. The comedic masterpieces they could have made. In the end 'Working at National Lampoon wasn't going to get you laid'. All most people know NL for is bad cheaply licensed movies. Anyone can affordably stamp the name on the straight to video box (well now it's just an image you click on to pirate the movie off a virus ridden site, cause no one would pay to watch that junk). Anyone who loves John or Bill will get a kick out of the old footage and stories, unfortunately, they never blessed the world with a movie starring them together.
This movie is an homage to classic 80's teen comedies, only better. Many of those movies did the same stereotypical cast, jokes, and gags repeatedly. They all had the Asian guy who was a tech wizard. The jock whose nickname was a thinly veiled reference to his junk. The stoner, the horn dog, the clueless parents that come around in the end, stupid adults the kids outsmart, sibling rivalry, horror-able sex acts, the holy grail quest to get laid, and lastly the sweet kid just trying to figure it out. Most think of Porky's or the John Hughes movies. As funny as Porky's was, it wasn't a very good movie in many ways, naked girls just to have naked girls, poor camera work, over the top raunchy script setting up studios to lose focus on cinematography and dialog for the rest of the decade. It wasn't until Kevin Smith's Clerks in 1994 that anyone spent time developing dialog again. Watching the John Hughes movies now, all the characters are one-dimensional and teens always win/figure life out in the end, type of boring. Not, that these movies weren't good at the time, but they don't hold up well.
Pitching Tents is a good mixture of 'One Crazy Summer' (1986), 'Last American Virgin' (1982), and maybe 'Meatballs' (1979). The director Jacob Cooney has a George Millerian skill in communicating information to the viewer non-verbally. Which is the only way this movie would work. With a large cast of charterers, he is able to introduce them seamlessly without veering off course from the plot. While avoiding over redundant stereotypes that make many movies unwatchable/predicable. Jacob does a good job of showcasing the beautiful women in this movie. Made difficult by hideous 80's fashion. All the girls are way too beautiful to wear waist high, pleated, acid-washed jeans. Not the typical 'have the girl jump up and down' gonzo directing so many teen films have. The steamy make-out scene in the woods is way hotter than the standard mandatory 'the movie needs this' nude scene. One of the hard things to secure for this movie had to beGrandpas mint condition boxy 80's boat. Image trying to pitch dear old pappy on letting his cherry vintage ride he has waxed twice a week for the last forty years to be used in a movie about a wild drug party in the woods with a side quest for Goddess Camp. A movie you never can let him watch due to the weird necrophilia-beastiality and drug use in his car. Pitching Tents YouTube Trailer From start to finish this was a funny enjoyable movie to watch. Mister fast forward button wasn't needed once, the first or second viewing. The dialog does have many raunchy jokes, keeping with the feel of eighties teen comedies. Without being dependent on them. It has plenty of witty quick dialog, more in tune with a Joss Whedon vehicle than anything from forty years ago. Great period soundtrack with talented actors. Both Samantha Basalari and Micheal Grant should be in more movies in the future. Best eighties teen film since the eighties!
This was a lost film for most of its existence. Lost films happened in many ways. Nitrate film stock used before 1952 is flammable causing film fires wiping thousands of films off the face of the earth. Fox had a big fire in 1937 wiping out their film vault and MGM had one in 1967 taking out many early films. Most film buffs have at least heard of Metropolis (1927) which was lost but found early in the new millennium. Most studios didn't then have a way to monetize movies after their theatrical run until TV, home video and art houses came around. So there was little interest in preserving or storing them, even though a copy of every film since 1909 was to be preserved in the Library of Congress. Interesting to note Lon Chaney Sr. film London after Midnight (1927) is also on the lists of lost films even though through promo photographs they have reconstructed the entire movie from stills. Luckily for us, this movie miraculously was released on VHS in the late 90's, when an owner of a television station in Finland realized the rights had lapsed allowing him to sell copies of the reel he had.
Spider Baby had a rough go of it from the start. Starting with a minuscule budget of $65,000. Causing it to be filmed in black & white. Even though since Technicolor 'Process 4' came out in 1932, color films had become the standard. Televisions since the mid-fifties had color available. For budget reference, The Night of the Living Dead (1968) had a budget of $114, 000. So Spider Baby was made for little over half of what George Romero scraped together. The interior scenes were filmed in a warehouse in Glendale California in the middle of summer with no air conditioning (studio was going broke). Which had the effect of making most of the actors look bat crazy between sweating and being a moment away from heatstroke. The viewers get the sense that Lon Chaney was going to mentally snap at any time. After the studio went bankrupt it sat for several years before being released with little fan fair. With several name changes The liver Eaters, The Attack of the Liver Eaters, Jack Hill's Spider Baby, Cannibal Orgy, Or the Maddest Story Ever Told it never had much of a chance and the lyrics in the opening don't make much sense unless the movie is named Cannibal Orgy.
At the time of its release, the most famous cast member was Mantan Moreland who starred in many early comedies as a house boy, manservant, or chauffeur playing a stereotypical character. Mr. Moreland broke many barriers for black actors but the style of comedy he was known for was quickly swept under the rug after the civil rights movements in the 50's.
Lon Chaney Jr. was mostly known for low-budget horror movies and as the guy that played the Wolfman. Even though his father had taught him make-up, strict union rule prevented him from doing anything with it. Watch some of Lon Chaney Sr.'s films, the level of horror he brought to the screen with no help from CGI, modern camera tricks or sound is remarkable. There was a huge gap in the world of horror movies for make-up, from Chaney Sr. to Rick Baker in the seventies. A piece of horror movie trivia is Chaney jr. is the only person to play all four of the major Universal monsters on film.
Sid Haig gives a standout performance in this movie. Still very bald (didn't that guy ever have hair?). But wandered in bit parts as a heavy for forty years until Quentin Tarantino and Rob Zombie came calling. Looking at his list of credits he literally played a bad guy on every TV show in history Star Trek, Six Million Dollar Man, Dukes of Hazzard, and A-Team to name a few. But he, like the director, wouldn't be appreciated till many years later.
Jack Hill wrote and directed many of the well-known exploration movies in the seventies Foxy Brown, Coffy, The Big Bird Cage, Switch Blade Sisters and The Terror (with Jack freaking Nicholson and Boris motherfing Karloff). He said just as long as he put blood, violence, and nudity in the films the studios would allow him to add intelligent ideas and concepts in the films. Hill left movies all too soon cause the movies the studios green lit for him weren't exactly what he wanted. His student film 'The Host' (1960) is well worth watching. The only place to find it is a bonus feature on the Switch Blade Sisters DVD. Francis Ford Coppola said 'The Host' was a major influence on the last part of Apocalypse Now (1979).
The movie tells the story of a family chauffeur that made a death-bed promise to the head of the household to keep the family together and hide their dark secrets. A family that has skeletons in the closet, bed, basement, and dumb-waiter. Caused by a disease that runs in the maternal DNA that causes members to regress after the age of ten to a primitive state. The chauffeur played by Chaney is barely hanging on to his own sanity. Having to take care of covering up the transgressions of the household he is slowly being tasked with more and more hideous chores. When into the red with no warning, distant family members come sniffing around hearing rumors of a family fortune. Spider Baby Full Movie Public Domain YouTube
There is a reason this film has grown a huge mass cult following, with only being available in the last twenty years, missing the building a fan base over most of its early life-like most films, it's very well done. Rated a seven on IMDB and 100% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. The 2007 release has some cool special features namely the early 2000's premier. Sadly Lon Chaney, Mantan Moreland and Jill Banner (played Virginia Merrye) all past a few years after the theatrical release of the film. Any aspiring filmmaker should watch this film to see what is possible with no budget and twelve days. It's entertaining from beginning to end. The only real knock is towards the end the make-up they used for Uncle Ned, makes it feel like they had no budget or time. Still not as bad as the tall alien at the end of 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' (1977) seriously what was up with that dandy long legs alien? That's not even the worst thing about that movie, family man Roy jumps on a spaceship and no one is like what about your wife and kids, he doesn't think to ask how long this trip to another galaxy is going to take or when his family should expect him home, Roy is clearly the villain of CE3K and a deadbeat dad. Have fun with this goody but an oldie and don't be a bug caught up in a spider web! Whatever you do, don't play the spider game........
The funniest thing about this movie the guy who played "The Brain" got the role by agreeing to run through Times Square naked. This guy thought 'no way in hell the producers of this low budget film, who are operating out of a van down by the river, will ever come up with the money to fly me and cameraman out there to film it'. Well, he ended up getting accosted by a bunch of old ladies while he was running through Times Square naked, who turned out to be undercover cops. The second thing is that very toned leg coming out of a very tight short leather miniskirt IS NOT Female! Warwick Davis is entertaining, way too big for this movie, and accent was out of place! It's weird to have this inbreed family in the middle of nowhere to have a member with a thick English Accent. Even weirder is his weapon of choice.
The heroine is a very pretty one and done actress. I'm always amazed when I see a talented actor or actress but they only did one movie than they disappear. No one thinks of how long it takes for a movie to make it. Especially a pasty D&D fanboy living in mommy's basement, but think they have their own place cause they have a whole level to themselves except for laundry days, creepy weirdos that watch this type of movie. Once a low budget gets made, travels the film festival circuit, gets picked up, has the distributor adds a nude scene or two, then releases it on VHS or bundles the rights with a couple Cirio H. Santiago films to be shown on late night cable. Couple years later the right people start noticing the film and want to cast the actress in their film. But she is now married with children and embarrassed about the "artistic" film she did in college. Even well known widescreen releases don't cause good actors don't break out right away, Kevin Bacon went back to small acting parts after Animal House (wonder why Friday the Thirteenth got such a big name.... he was still a starving actor), Rose McGowan went nine years after Encino Man (she was the actress that did the body art on the sliding glass door at the end) before Generation Doom came along. Not saying any actor in this movie is good enough to be in another one, just the actress was a couple levels up on the old Dante meter than the rest of the cast. Definitely a level or two above being buried up to one's nose in human waste with people stepping on your head.
Movies like this show talented people can make an enjoyable low-budget movie that other people besides relatives who politely nod and smile, while desperately trying to go to their happy place hoping for the horror to end. Not the horror like in horror movie but like soul sucking, never getting this hour back, want to shove a Cheeto in the their eye so something interesting will happen, or at the very least they can get out of watching the rest of the artistic expression that can't be called a movie cause the definition movie is an interesting visual representation of a great story. I hope they didn't show this to relatives if they ever wanted to be invited for Easter brunch ever again. Not saying this is a good movie by major motion pictures standards, more of this make more sense if you're tripping on acid after lobotomy surgery. God knows how they got Warwick Davis to be in this movie. He must be into some sick twisted stuff to be blackmailed to do this sick twisted movie.
Just something about an inbreed, backwater family, that have enough mental issues to make Dr. Phil go screaming buck naked down the street in the middle of the night, makes for great low budget horror or X-Files episode. There are more than a few scenes that will leave a scared image on the brain, and a few others that leave the watcher more confused than a millennial stuck in a panic room with a rotary phone. But anyone watching discount bin trash like this already has a few mental issues......
