SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: SLEEPING BEAUTY (2014) ** ½

(Streamed via Peacock)

A movie based on the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale doesn’t immediately sound like something I’d watch for The 31 Days of Horror-Ween.  It kind of makes more sense when you realize it’s The Asylum’s mockbuster version of Maleficent.  The real reason I wanted to see it was because it was the directing debut of one of my favorite actors, Casper Van Dien.

Van Dien also has a small role as Sleeping Beauty’s father.  He even managed to get the whole Van Dien clan acting gigs in this one.  His then-wife, the ever-lovely Catherine Oxenberg, plays the Queen, and his daughter Grace stars as Sleeping Beauty.  His other children have small roles as well.  Why have Grimm’s Fairy Tales, when you can have Van Dien’s Fairy Tales?

The first fifteen minutes or so sets up the Sleeping Beauty legend rather succinctly.  The big twist is that after the evil witch (Olivia D’Abo) tricks Sleeping Beauty into pricking her finger on a spindle, everyone in the village falls asleep along with the narcoleptic royal.  Flash-forward a hundred years, and a whipping boy named Barrow (Finn Jones) finds a map to Sleeping Beauty’s castle.  The arrogant Prince (Edward French) makes him lead the way so he can get his grubby hands on some prime princess real estate.  Naturally, Barrow proves to be much more of a man than the Prince and he sets out to wake Sleeping Beauty his own self.

Despite the title, there are just enough monsters and ghouls here to warrant including the film in the Halloween season festivities.  Once our heroes reach the castle, they are greeted by a moat monster who gobbles up one of the Prince’s squires.  Within the castle walls, they do battle with another CGI beastie.  The evil queen even unleashes a horde of zombies on the Prince and his men.  I’m not sure I remember that in the Disney version. 

Also, there’s an entire subplot lifted from Aliens in which a little girl who has survived inside the castle undetected helps the heroes.  Heck, her name is Newt!  They didn’t even bother to change it!  Not to be outdone, there’s a scene where D’Abo rips off a guy’s head with his spinal cord still intact just like a Predator.  You won’t see Angelina Jolie pulling that shit, that’s for sure.

Van Dien proves to be a competent director.  Although obviously not a big budget production, the film feels much bigger in scope than your typical Asylum picture.  Van Dien’s handling of the monster attacks and fight scenes shows he’s much more adept at his craft than many of his Asylum filmmaking contemporaries.  While it is a bit of a bait and switch (the middle section of the film feels more like a Lord of the Rings rip-off than a Sleeping Beauty rip-off), it was much better than I was expecting.  As far as The Asylum’s movies go, it’s no Mega Python vs. Gatoroid, but it’s watchable and semi-entertaining, even if it never quite crosses over into the realm of “good”.  

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: THE SUPERNATURALS (1987) * ½

(Streamed via Dark Matter TV)

The Supernaturals is a frustrating experience because it takes an intriguing premise and proceeds to do zilch with it.  Because of that, it’s a prime candidate to be remade.  Before we start thinking about what could’ve been, let’s take a look at what it was, which admittedly ain’t much.

The opening is strong though.  At the end of the Civil War, a bunch of Union soldiers line up a battalion of men from the Confederate army (including one kid who was just wearing a uniform) and force them to walk through a minefield.  A century or so goes by, and a squad of Army soldiers head out into the same woods to perform practice maneuvers.  Eventually, they come face to face with a zombie army that may or may not be at the beck and call of a ghostly woman (Margaret Shendal) who lives in the woods.

Star Trek fans may get a kick out of seeing Nichelle Nichols bossing LeVar Burton around.  Nichols is hilariously miscast as the hardass drill instructor, but she at least gamely commits to the role.  Maxwell Caulfield is the leading man, and he doesn’t do a bad job, although I don’t think his pompadour hairdo would be considered Army regulation.  Oh, and The Bee Gees’ Maurice Gibb has a cameo too.  WTF.

While director Armand (He Knows You’re Alone) Mastroianni does a fine job on the prologue, he can’t quite find a way to make the present-day scenes work.  He also takes a helluva long time to get the show on the road as the first half is particularly draggy.  It would be one thing to sit through the laborious build-up if the payoff was up to snuff, but it’s fucking weak.  The zombie army scenes are rushed and lackluster, and the finale looks really chintzy. 

The subtext of the Confederate spirits haunting modern-day folk is a sturdy one, but Mastroianni doesn’t quite milk it for all its worth.  I think if it was ever remade, the Army platoon should be entirely played by people of color.  It would be an interesting updating that could effectively modernize the concept and give it greater relevance.  As it is, there’s nothing very super about The Supernaturals.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: WOLFBLOOD (1925) **

(Streamed via Digital Drive-In)

Dick Bannister (George Chesebro, who also co-directed) is appointed the new foreman of a logging company.  He meets Edith Ford (Marguerite Clayton), the owner of the operation, and the two instantly become smitten, despite the fact that she is engaged to a fledgling doctor named Eugene (Ray Hanford).  When Dick catches Deveroux (Roy Watson), the company’s biggest competitor, trying to construct an illegal dam, there is a confrontation, and Dick is badly wounded.  Eugene is forced to save his life via blood transfusion, but when the only acceptable donor refuses to lend a hand, he is forced to complete the transfusion with wolf’s blood.  Before long, word gets out that Dick has the blood of a wolf flowing through his veins, and the loggers soon shun him, thinking he’s some kind of freak.  When Deveroux is found with his throat tore out, Dick starts to suspect he might be turning into a wolf.

Made in 1925 (ten years before Universal’s Werewolf of London), Wolfblood is one of the earliest attempts at a werewolf movie.  It doesn’t really lean into the horror elements until the last ten minutes, and even then, it’s all kind of halfhearted.  The make-up is a lot more subtle than you’d expect (Chesebro only has a five o’clock shadow), but the scene where he follows his wolf brethren through the forest for a midnight run is atmospheric.  Most of the “horror” though comes from his life being ruined by cheap gossip. 

The last ten minutes are kind of fun, especially if you are a student of werewolf cinema and want to see the humble origins.  Till then, you have to sit through a lot of lumberjack melodrama and ho-hum love triangle shit.  If you’re a fan of silent horror films, that shouldn’t be too much of a chore as it’s only 67 minutes long.  Less patient viewers will probably find Wolfblood rather anemic. 

AKA:  Wolfsblood.  AKA:  Wolfblood:  A Tale of the Forest.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: DRACULA: PAGES FROM A VIRGIN’S DIARY (2003) ** ½

(Streamed via FilmRise)

From the title, you’d assume (as I did) this was going to be a smutty softcore version of the Dracula legend.  However, it’s a rather fascinating, if only intermittently successful bait-and-switch.  The first tip-off this isn’t going to be what you think is comes during the opening credits, which state it’s “based on a ballet”.  That’s right folks, this is actually a ballet version of Dracula! 

Now, as I’m sure you all can guess, I’m definitely not a ballet kind of guy, but if you want me to watch your ballet movie, making it an adaptation of the Bram Stoker classic is a step in the right direction. 

Another cool touch is that it’s entirely done in the style of an old silent movie.  The title cards are updated and modernized, but the sepia-tone look alternately resembles a German expressionist picture and a ‘90s music video.  This helps to gives the ballet sequences a timeless and sometimes dreamlike feel. 

One other novel twist:  Dracula is Asian. 

The film takes some liberties with the novel, but it is rather faithful in most respects.  The big difference is that the first half of the movie is devoted to the character of Lucy (Tara Birtwhistle) and her seduction at the hands of Dracula (Zhang Wei-Qiang).  She gets several big dance numbers in her bedroom, and another one in her crypt when Van Helsing (David Moroni) and company come calling to drive a stake through her heart. 

This is the most effective section, mostly because it feels like a breath of fresh air compared to so many other dull retreads.  The second act kicks off with a fast-forward recap of Dracula’s business with Jonathan Harker (Johnny A. Wright) before he moves on to try to put the bite on Harker’s fiancé Mina (CindyMarie Small).  The finale, in which Dracula gets his eventual comeuppance is kind of cool, but for the most part, the second half pales next to the stuff with Lucy. 

Combining ballet with Dracula is such a simple but provocative idea that I’m a little surprised it hadn’t been done before.  I can’t say Dracula:  Pages from a Virgin’s Diary works as a whole, but it remains an interesting attempt.  It's certainly more memorable and offbeat than most of the movies I’ve watched this month.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: GOTHIC VAMPIRES FROM HELL: BATTLE OF THE BANDS (2007) **

(Streamed via Yuyu TV)

A rock band called Gothic Vampires from Hell enters a battle of the bands concert at a goth nightclub.  There, they meet a record executive named Annastasia Nightshade (Gina DeVettori) who is looking for “new blood” for her label.  That’s obviously code for “turn the group into vampires”.

Gothic Vampires from Hell:  Battle of the Bands is a shot-on-video, microbudget horror flick that’s padded with musical performances and filled with annoying CGI effects.  As far as these things go, it isn’t too bad.  At least it’s short.

The guys look the part of goth posers they resemble dweebs dressed in The Crow cosplay.  (The main guy is even named “Draven” for Christ’s sake.)  The ladies in the group look out of place though as they just seem like skanks you’d see at a regular club.  The music doesn’t seem very goth either as it sounds more like lightweight rock n’ roll.  Also, you kind of have to laugh when the bands are in the midst of the big “battle of the bands” contest and the movie cuts away to maybe like twelve people in total in the bar listening to the music.

The gore is over the top though, which helps.  I liked the scene where a dying guy delivered a long monologue while arterial spray continued to spew out of his gaping neck wound.  In fact, you have to wonder if the vampires ever get any nourishment from their victims as so much blood erupts like a goddamned geyser from their necks. 

The gore effects may be good, but the CGI is anything but.  The animated bats are downright laughable, although I will admit CGI flames looked slightly better.  That dancing CGI fairy (?) on the other hand?  That’s truly WTF. 

The only nudity comes courtesy of a BBW club girl who is put into a trance by one of the sexy vampires and is forced to strip.  I also liked the red-tinted scenes from Nosferatu that were superimposed over the sex scene.  That was a nice touch.  If there was a little bit more skin, this might’ve skated by with a ** ½ rating, but who knows.

The big problem is that it’s heavily padded with mediocre musical numbers.  Probably a third of the running time is devoted to the band playing their music on stage and/or the clubgoers stumbling around trying to dance.  The ending is further padded out by repeating various kills that occurred during the film while the band performs their final number.  Then again, it’s hard to completely hate any movie that uses about as much blood as the Red Cross goes through in a month, so for that and that alone, I can’t give it any less than **.

AKA:  Gothic Vampires from Hell.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: FLAVIA, THE HERETIC (1977) ***

(Streamed via Drive-In Classics)

Flavia (Florinda Bolkan, who sort of has a Laura Gemser quality about her) witnesses her father decapitating a helpless soldier on the battlefield, so he has her locked away in a convent. There, she is subject to humiliation and torture at the hands of her fellow sisters. She tries to escape, but she is captured and brought back to suffer some more.  Flavia then shacks up with a Muslim warrior whose army has sacked the city, and together they take over the convent and get revenge on those who wronged her.

Flavia, the Heretic is more of a nunsploitation flick than an outright horror film, and director Gianfranco Mingozzi’s handling of the admittedly lurid material is more artsy than exploitative.  However, there are several unsettling sequences here that are sure to shock you.  Heck, there was even a moment or two that made this dyed-in-the-wool gorehound squirm in his seat.  From the order of horny “Tarantula Women”, to the rape in a pig sty, to the disgusting horse castration scene, there’s something here to offend just about everybody, and I mean that in the best possible way. 

But wait, there’s more.  There are torture scenes, nipples cut off, flogging, pissing, orgies, and even cannibalism too.  The nightmares, hallucinations, and sequences of blasphemous visions are effective too.

It also helps that Bolkan delivers a heck of a performance as the hateful, spiteful Flavia.  If only Anthony Higgins, who plays Flavia’s lover was the slightest bit intimidating.  Instead, he looks more like a member of an early ‘00s boy band than a Muslim warrior.  In the spirit of the nuns featured in the movie, I think I can forgive him.

Ultimately, Flavia, the Heretic is too long and sluggishly paced to be considered a classic.  Devotees of naughty nun cinema will sit up and take notice of the wild imagery and sacrilegious antics though.  It’s so nasty, you’ll probably feel the need to go to confession after you see it.

AKA:  Flavia:  Heretic Priestess.  AKA:  Flavia the Rebel Nun.  AKA:  Flavia, Priestess of Violence.  AKA:  The Heretic.  AKA:  The Muslim Nun.  AKA:  The Rebel Nun.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: CITADEL (2012) ** ½

 

(Streamed via ConTV)

Tommy (Aneurin Barnard) watches in horror as his very pregnant wife is assaulted by a gang of juvenile hooligans in their apartment building.  After that traumatic incident, he develops an aggressive case of agoraphobia.  Tommy struggles to get help all the while caring for his infant.  Problems arise when he tries to confront his fears, which leads to the gruesome kiddies kidnapping his baby.  He then turns to a foulmouthed priest (James Cosmo, in full-on Brian Cox mode) to help rescue his baby and send those evil brats back to Hell.

In all honesty, Citadel probably works better now than when it was released back in 2012.  Nowadays, just about everyone is afraid to leave their home, so we are all the more sympathetic to our hero’s dilemma.  Director Ciaran Foy does a good job of hinting at the possibility the gang might be a delusion of our already mentally frail hero.  I mean, it doesn’t take Freud to figure out this roving band of killer kiddies just might be a manifestation of his impending fear of fatherhood.

Citadel won’t be for everyone, especially considering the fact that it puts a baby in jeopardy at several junctions.  I know it’s kind of a low blow to resort to something that, but some of these scenes really work.  Sometimes, you got to hit below the belt in order to get people’s attention. 

Too bad the wheels fall off during the third act.  Things are especially weak whenever the film tries to gratuitously “explain” why the kids are the way they are.  It was a lot creepier when we didn’t know.  Much of the mythology behind the terrorizing tykes is unneeded and/or just plain dumb.  (The lone “good” kid seems like he stepped out of a Shyamalan movie.)  That said, the opening is a real grabber, and there’s at least one harrowing sequence here to ensure Foy’s place as a filmmaker to watch.  (Naturally, he immediately shit the bed with his next effort, the totally lame Sinister 2.)

AKA:  Enter the Darkness.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: VIRAL (2016) **

(Streamed via MovieSphere Free)

Well, when you’re in the midst of a pandemic and you decide to devote an entire month to watching horror movies, it’s only a matter of time before you wind up watching one about a pandemic.  From that standpoint, it’s interesting to see what the filmmakers (in this case Paranormal Activity 2 and 3’s Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman) accurately predicted.  Viral contains scenes where families watch Presidential addresses for more information on the virus, towns being placed under quarantine, people wearing masks, and stupid teens defying curfew orders to go to a party, causing the virus to spread even further.  I’d say they hit the hammer on the nail in that respect.  As a horror movie though, it just never really comes together.

The virus, known as “Worm Flu”, infects its victims with a parasitic worm that controls their actions and forces them to infect others.  Sisters Emma (Sofia Black-D’Elia) and Stacey (Analeigh Tipton) are forced to stay in their home when the viral outbreak ravages their town.  It’s only a matter of time before Stacey gets infected and Emma makes a desperate attempt to save her life.

It’s here where Joost and Schulman deliver the film’s lone nasty set piece, but it’s a good one.  Emma knocks Stacey out and performs an emergency worm-ectomy on her diseased sister.  Imagine an episode of Dr. Pimple Popper, but with giant worms, and that might give you a clue as to what to expect. 

Other than that fun sequence, the film never really gets into gear.  It feels like it doesn’t know whether to be a viral outbreak movie or a straight up zombie flick.  It ultimately tries to split the difference, which leads to some uneven results. 

The last ten minutes feels tacked on, almost as if it was a reshoot meant to up the horror quotient.  If the movie ended with the emergency surgery scene, it might’ve skated by with ** ½.  However, it tries to cram in both an additional zombified citizen attack AND a needless nightmare sequence, both of which are extremely lackluster.  Still, it’s better than either of the directors’ Paranormal Activity flicks, although that’s not saying much. 

It helps that the two stars deliver solid performances.  Black-D’Elia (who was fun to watch on the short-lived TV show, The Mick) does a fine job as the goodie two-shoes sister.  Tipton is equally good as her wild child sibling, but unfortunately, many of her scenes are opposite her boyfriend, played by rapper Machine Gun Kelly, whose performance is painfully embarrassing.  He should stick to spitting rhymes because he’s not too convincing at spitting blood.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: THE DESCENT: PART 2 (2010) ***

(Streamed via Pluto TV)

Sarah (Shauna Macdonald) barely escapes battling slimy cave monsters with her life.  After a brief rest in the hospital, the sheriff (Gavan O’Herlihy from Superman 3 and Death Wish 3) demands to know where her friends are.  Since her memory is a little screwy, and she doesn’t remember the first movie very well (who could blame her?) she stupidly agrees to lead the police and a small rescue team back into the caves.  It’s only until they’ve walked around the caves for half the running time does she realize, “Oh shit, that’s right!  There are monsters down here!” before all hell breaks loose… again.

This movie has balls, I’ll give it that.  Hollywood usually spends a lot of time and money trying to think up ways to make the characters do all the things they did in the original once again for the sequel.  This time out, they just have the character have some half-assed form of amnesia, so she doesn’t remember tangoing with the bat monsters from the first flick.  You have to give the filmmakers credit for making the lead character as stupid as they think the audience is.

Thankfully, I must be rock stupid because I liked this one a lot more than the (wildly) overpraised original.

First off, let me just say it was wonderful seeing Gavan O’Herlihy in a sizable role again.  He’s a lot older and greyer than the last time I saw him.  In fact, he REALLY looks like his old man, Dan now.

Macdonald doesn’t leave much of an impression though.  She really didn’t make much of an impression in the first movie to be completely honest.  In fact, I had to look on IMDb to make sure they didn’t just find another actress to play her part.

Mostly, this is another one of those People with Flashlights Walking Down a Long Hallway and Looking for Other People movie, except the hallway in question is a series of unending caves and some of the people have flashlights attached to their helmets.  Other than that, it’s the same old shit as the first movie, except with way less women.

The good news is, as far as these things go, it’s technically competent.  It’s also gory as fuck.  Among the juicy tidbits:  Finger biting, head crushing, and brain drilling.  You just have to admire any director who gives us multiple monster attack scenes where the humans kill the monsters by jabbing them in the throat or face and blood and ooze erupts from the wound and cascades into the would-be victim’s screaming mouth. 

The director, Jon Harris, also edited the original Descent, by the way.  It’s a shame he hasn’t sat in the director’s chair since because he delivered a number of memorable sequences.  There’s a nasty scene where the search party stumbles over a rotting fileted corpse that suddenly begins moving unexpectedly.  I also dug the scene in which some rescue workers had to swing on a corpse like Tarzan in order to get to safety.  Probably the best part though is when a few characters find themselves in the creatures’ toilet, complete with a shot of the monster taking a shit.  You don’t see that every day.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: ANNABELLE COMES HOME (2019) ***

(Streamed via HBO Max)

I run hot-to-cold on these Conjure-Verse movies.  The first Conjuring was pretty good, but the sequel was merely so-so.  The spin-offs are increasingly hit-and-miss, with Annabelle being one of the worst major studio releases of the 21^st century.  The sequel, Annabelle:  Creation was a step in the right direction, although it was no great shakes either.  Well, I’m happy to report that the Annabelle spin-off series has finally found its stride with the fun, entertaining, and surprisingly heartfelt Annabelle Comes Home. 

As you probably remember, paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) acquired the haunted Annabelle doll and locked it away in their occult basement so it wouldn’t harm anyone.  When they go out of town, they hire a smoking hot babysitter named Mary Ellen (Madison Iseman) to watch their kid (Mckenna Grace).  Naturally, Mary Ellen brings her friend Daniela (Katie Sarife) along, and when no one is looking, she goes down in the basement and accidentally wakes up, not only Annabelle, but all the cursed knickknacks the Warrens have locked up (and for good reason).

I thought it was a nice touch to bring The Conjuring stars Wilson and Farmiga into the spin-off series, but as it turns out, their scenes are actually the weakest element.  Since the movie runs a whopping 106 minutes, their stuff could’ve easily been whittled down.  (They really should’ve had extended cameos.)  Instead, they clog up the first act with a lot of unnecessary rigmarole that prevents the show from getting immediately on the road. 

Once the sexy babysitters unleash the deranged doll from her case, the supernatural shit hits the fan, and the movie goes into overdrive.  This is the kind of film Sam Raimi would call a “Spook-a-Blast”.  Some monster or ghoul is constantly popping out at the audience every five minutes while the soundtrack blares.  No one ever seems to be hurt or in any serious danger, but it’s a helluva fun ride. 

The most surprising part of the movie is that you actually care about these characters.  In most horror flicks, the character of Daniela would’ve been an annoying third wheel who lets the monsters loose because she’s a klutz or something.  Although she starts out with that kind of vibe, we soon learn she is dealing with some major issues and we can sort of sympathize why she does what she does. 

Likewise, Mary Ellen isn’t your average Babysitter Final Girl.  She feels like a real flesh and blood character, and her friendship with Daniela is natural and genuine.  Heck, even the creepy Warren kid is likeable.  In most of these things, whenever a creepy kid sees dead people, they come off as either precocious brats or annoying thumbsuckers.  Here, she is grappling with her “gift”, but still trying to eke out an existence as a regular kid.  It helps that Iseman, Sarife, and Grace have a lot of chemistry together, and when they team up to fight the evil in the basement, you can’t help but root for them.

The basement, it should be said, is a little overcrowded.  I don’t know if the filmmakers were too busy trying to spin-off more spin-offs from this spin-off, but this movie is loaded with (probably too many) monsters, ghosts, and demons.  There are Ferrymen, Killer Brides, Ghost Samurai, and even a goddamn werewolf on the hunt for the kids.  In fact, you have to wonder where the heck Annabelle is some of the time.  Maybe they were trying to do an Avengers team-up deal with all the monsters in the basement rallying together in the name of evil.  It’s all just silly enough to work, although there are times when the wheels threaten to come flying off.

It ultimately comes down to one word:  Fun.  If you’re looking for subtle, intellectual horror, this ain’t it.  If, however, you enjoy horror movies that feel more like a ride, Annabelle Comes Home will be a more than welcome homecoming. 

AKA:  Annabelle 3.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: RATS (2003) * ½

(Streamed via Popcornflix)

Rats is a low budget When Animals Attack flick produced by the folks at Nu Image.  It was directed by Tibor Takacs, who made one of the greatest SyFy Channel movies ever made, Mansquito.  Unfortunately, Rats is no Mansquito.  Then again, what could be?

Ron Perlman is the only name in the cast, but with a name like Ron Perlman one name is all you need.  He plays the head of the Brookdale Institute for the Criminally Insane.  Sara Downing is the new inmate who comes to the institute because of her drug addiction and suicidal tendencies.  Before long, she starts seeing rats everywhere, but naturally, nobody believes her.  No one even notices when the rats start devouring patients left and right because one of the screwy inmates (who has a psychic link with the beasties) covers up their crimes. 

Written by the team of Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch (who also wrote the Toolbox Murders remake), Rats is a weird hybrid of mental institution movie and killer rat flick.  With all the scenes of patients hanging out in the day room, attending group therapy, and being scolded by nurses, it feels like One Flew Over the Rat’s Nest.  Or maybe Girl, Interrupted by Rats.  Or A Nightmare on Rat Street 3:  Rat Warriors.  Whatever the title should be, the truth is, the two elements never really gel together.

The nuthouse scenes are particularly slow moving, which only leaves us the rat attack sequences.  They are frankly hit and miss.  There gore quotient is low, the red-tinted Rat POV is annoying, and many of the scenes are ruined by the crummy CGI rats.  The most inspired bit is the odd scene involving two exterminators who are all decked out with equipment that would made the Ghostbusters envious.  Using infrared goggles, they locate scurrying rats and use large taser guns to make them explode.  Too bad they get turned into Rat Chow before the scene ever has a chance to gain momentum.

AKA:  Killer Rats.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: BOOKS OF BLOOD (2020) *

(Streamed via Hulu)

Books of Blood is based on a trio of Clive Barker stories.  It was directed by Brannon Braga, a longtime writer and producer on various Star Trek movies and TV shows.  He should stick to that Vulcan shit because this is one book worth burning.    

The first book is about “Jenna” (*).  She’s a surly, angsty, anxiety-ridden teenager.  Something Bad Happened at School and she won’t talk about it, so her parents sent her to the Funny Farm.  Once she's back home, she goes off her meds, flips her shit, and runs away.  She stays at a boardinghouse ran by a seemingly nice couple, but eventually Jenna realizes she was better off in the nuthouse.

This story is by far the longest in the group (nearly an hour) and it is chockfull of annoying red herrings, failed set-ups, and missed opportunities.  There’s a lot made of Jenna’s fear of chewing, but nothing is ever done with it.  There’s also a lot of business with her wearing noise-cancelling headphones because of her phobia, and yet it’s almost instantly forgotten when the story goes into the homestretch.  Instead, it zigs when it should’ve zagged, and it hobbles along to a frustrating and maddeningly unsatisfying conclusion.  It also doesn’t help that the character herself is extremely annoying.

The second story is “Miles” (**).  A professor (Anna Friel) is grieving over the death of her young son, Miles when a man (Rafi Gavron) drops in on her claiming to have contact with her son.  Thinking he’s a charlatan, she sets to make an example of him, only to learn his gift is all too real. 

This tale is not very good, but it is a major step up from the first installment.  The twist is painfully predictable, and the performances are quite bland.  However, it moves along at a steady clip and at least has enough blood in it to justify the title (unlike Jenna).

The final story is “Bennett” (*).  Two hitmen murder a target (seen during the pre-title sequence of the movie) and take off in search of a valuable book.  Their quest leads them to a bad part of town, and by that, I mean it’s fucking haunted.  It doesn’t take them long to realize the book isn’t quite the antique they were expecting.

This segment tries to connect the stories a la Pulp Fiction.  (It even stars a pair of pop culture-referencing hitmen.)  Unlike Jenna, this story feels like it’s on fast-forward.  I actually thought I accidentally skipped a part, but no, it’s just really fucking choppy.  To make matters worse, just when you think it’s over, it cuts back for ten more excruciating minutes of Jenna’s story.

I don’t know why it’s so hard to do right by Clive Barker when it comes to adaptations of his work.  After he directed Hellraiser himself, it’s been all downhill.  In fact, this one is even worse than some of those DTV Hellraiser sequels, if you can fucking believe it.  

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: OFFERINGS (1989) **

(Streamed via Midnight Pulp)

A creepy mute kid is dared by bullies to walk around the edge of a well.  One of the kids pushes him in, and as a result, he winds up spending the next ten years in a catatonic state at a mental institution.  Naturally, he wakes up, returns to his hometown, and begins killing off the people who wronged him when he was a child. 

Offerings is yet another low budget Halloween clone.  It’s probably one of the most unabashed ones I’ve seen.  It’s not terrible, just formulaic.  It probably works better as a time capsule than a horror movie because of the bad fashions and even worse hair. 

It’s very much following a blueprint, but it’s one that works.  Like Halloween, many of the kills are bloodless or occur offscreen.  Even the back-from-the-dead scene where the killer rises up is the same.  The music is a blatant rip-off of John Carpenter’s score too.  We also get a death by hypodermic needle scene that’s reminiscent of Halloween 2.  One slight change is that the killer doesn’t eat a dog when he returns home, but a duck.

In fact, the movie is at its best when it’s doing its own thing.  I liked the scene where the killer ties up a guy in a work shed and tries to use a chainsaw on him, but it runs out of gas.  Then he tries a power drill, but it’s too low on charge.  Finally, he settles on twisting the vice till the guy’s head is crushed.  There’s also a novel bit where he kills a pizza delivery boy and substitutes the sausage topping with human flesh.  If the film really wanted to be successful, it should’ve added more of these little macabre touches.  As it stands, that’s about the best thing Offerings has to offer.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: BUS PARTY TO HELL (2017) *** ½

(Streamed via Vudu)

Bus Party to Hell tells the… wait… shouldn’t it be Party Bus to Hell?  I mean, I guess you can technically call it a “bus party” if you are having a party on a bus, but I’ve never once heard it referred to as such.  Heck, even the theme song that plays over the opening credits is called “Party Bus to Hell”.  In fact, the band even sings the words, “Party Bus to Hell” just as the title, “Bus Party to Hell” appears on screen.  Weird.  (As it turns out, it looks like the original title WAS Party Bus to Hell, but someone got the bright idea to change it to Bus Party to Hell.  What the fuck, Hollywood?)

Anyway, Bus Party to Hell tells the story of a bunch of partygoers who hop on a party bus in Vegas and head out into the desert on their way to Burning Man.  Naturally, they wind up stranded in the desert, and before long, their bus is attacked by a gaggle of desert-dwelling, Mad Max wannabe cult members who want to use the partygoers as human sacrifices.  It’s then up to our heroes to use whatever they have at their disposal to fight off the crazed cultists and survive the night.    

You know this is going to be a good movie because when Jillian Newton gets on the party bus it only takes her about a minute to become so drunk that she misplaces her top.  Because Jillian is a trooper, she keeps on partying.  In the next scene, we see a photographer (producer J. Spencer) in the desert who instructs his model (Devanny Pinn) to remove her top.  When she asks if he thinks that’s a little gratuitous, he replies, “There’s no such thing as gratuitous nudity.  That’s just in your mind.”

If you can’t already tell from the scads of nudity, this was directed by Rolfe Kanefsky, a veteran of such Skinamax movies as Sex Files:  Alien Erotica, The Erotic Misadventures of the Invisible Man, and Emmanuelle Through Time:  Emmanuelle’s Supernatural Sexual Activity.  If anything, Bus Party to Hell is proof he’s still going strong.  He also delivers on the horror-comedy elements as well as the film is frequently funny and often borderline hilarious.  I especially liked the scene where a cult member motorboated with a guy’s decapitated head, leaving his friend to muse, “He’s in a better place now.”  We also get a rather disgusting scene in which the cultists pin down a woman, force her mouth open, jam a snake down her throat, and then cut open her stomach and set the snake free.  That’s what I call some serious deep throat action.  The she-demon costume is also great.

Sure, this party bus may run out of gas near the end, but more often than not, it’s a funny, gory, and surprising ride.  Some of the sick humor is truly inspired.  I’m thinking specifically of the scene where a virgin is deflowered that is intercut with an impromptu dissection.  I also enjoyed the set-up for a sequel that is teased at the end.  I for one hope this is one Bus Party that continues to party on!

AKA:  Party Bus to Hell.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: BLOODSUCKING PHARAOHS IN PITTSBURGH (1991) *

(Streamed via The Film Detective)

A deranged killer is running around Pittsburgh murdering women and robbing them of their vital organs.  Birdwell (Jake Dengel) and Blocker (Joe Sharkey) are the cops on the case, and they haven’t been doing a very good job seeing how the murderer is up to victim number nineteen.  Blocker then reaches out to the daughter of his former partner (Susann Fletcher) to help catch the killer. 

Bloodsucking Pharaohs in Pittsburgh is basically another rehash of Blood Feast.  As with the OTHER Blood Feast-inspired retread, Blood Diner, the emphasis is more on comedy than gore.  At least Blood Diner had a goofy charm and sense of fun about it.  This one just comes off like a fourth-rate Airplane! rip-off.  Many of the gags are obvious (like the fake suspense music), tasteless (all the scenes with Birdwell’s wife), or just plain lame (Blocker is a homicide detective that… wait for it… can’t stand the sight of blood).  There’s also a scene involving a plane crashing into a building that probably hasn’t aged too well.

Even the special effects by the legendary Tom Savini are subpar.  I’m sure that had more to do with the film’s low budget than Savani’s considerable make-up prowess.  While many of the victims are dispatched in over the top fashion, the results are more cartoonish than out and out gory.  (There’s an OK face-ripping scene, but it’s indifferently staged.)  I can only chalk up his participation to the fact it was filmed in his hometown of Pittsburgh.  Or maybe he just needed to pay the rent. 

The big problem is that it’s painfully unfunny.  The cast just don’t have the comedic chops necessary to carry the non-horror scenes.  The detectives don’t have any chemistry together and have even less comic timing.  The only recognizable name in the cast is porn star Veronica Hart, who plays a clumsy waitress.  Her antics fail to garner any laughs either, but at least whenever she’s on screen, the film fitfully comes to life.  Then again, what can you say about a movie that takes a potentially intriguing concept as a trio of sexy (Egyptian?) Ninjas and still manages to screw it up.

AKA:  Picking Up the Pieces.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW (2012) *** ½

(Streamed via Xumo)

Elena (Eva Allen) is a patient at the mysterious Arboria Institute.  There, her creepy quack (Michael Rogers) keeps her under close surveillance.  Mostly for his own amusement (I guess), he lets her out of her cell so she can discover her surroundings. 

Beyond the Black Rainbow was written and directed by Panos (Mandy) Cosmatos, the son of Cobra director George P. Cosmatos.  He exhibits heavy influences from Kubrick, Carpenter, Cronenberg, and Lynch, but is still able to make the mosaic feel weirdly original at the same time.  While I am sure some viewers are bound to find it to be a marathon test of their patience, if you can get in tune with its bizarre wavelength, you should find yourself enjoying it as much as I did. 

Remember a while back when I watched Ad Astra and it almost left me in a trance?  This one just about did the same thing.  From the warm, vibrant colors to the droning soundtrack, to the sparse monotone voices, Beyond the Black Rainbow lulls you in.  Then… WHAM!  It brings on a trippy black and white flashback that’s as weird as anything in Begotten. 

Cosmatos gets a lot of mileage out of the lead performance by Rogers.  Looking like a wax figure of Christian Bale that’s miraculously come to life, he emits a creepy vibe that works hand in hand with the world Cosmatos has created.  (I especially liked the faux-vintage film strip for the Institute.)  When Rogers goes nuts in the final act, he doubles-down on the oddball touches and really gets under your skin.

Beyond the Black Rainbow isn’t all sunshine and roses though.  Did it really need to be close to two hours?  Probably not.  Is the ending anticlimactic and more than a bit lame?  (The two random metalhead characters notwithstanding.)  Kinda.  Till then though, it’s a wild ride that any lover of offbeat cinema will surely enjoy taking.  

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: KILLER MERMAID (2014) * ½

(Streamed via Crackle)

Kelly (Kristina Klebe, from Rob Zombie’s Halloween) and Lucy (Natalie Burn) go to Montenegro to hang out with an old college friend (Slobodan Stefanovic) and his bride to-be (Sofija Rajovic), leading to a lot of sunbathing, swimming, and infidelity.  They hear about an old abandoned military base on a remote island and decide it’s the perfect spot for a vacation getaway.  What they don’t tell you in the brochure is the place used to be home to Nazi experiments.  Once there, the gang are menaced by a deranged killer (Miodrag Krstovic) who stalks the grounds and acts as caretaker to a bloodthirsty siren of the sea (Zorana Kostic Obradovic). 

Basically, it’s Splash Meets Piranha with a bit of The Grim Reaper thrown in there. 

Killer Mermaid kicks off with a solid opening that immediately grabs your attention.  After the main title comes up, it promptly releases your attention, leaving you to flounder for the next ninety minutes.  Then you have to put up with a lot of long scenes of our heroines lollygagging around.  Once they finally shove off and make their way to the island, the pace moves even slower, if you can believe it.  From there, we get a lot of scenes of the girls walking down dark hallways, shining flashlights about, and saying stuff like, “Guys… where are you… this isn’t funny anymore”.  On top of that, you have to deal with the subplot about the killer caretaker plunging an oversized fishhook into people’s necks, which eats up a lot of screen time.

If you can’t already tell, it takes a long time for the Killer Mermaid to do her thing.  Once she finally does, it really isn’t worth the wait as the climax is sorry, soggy, and unsatisfying.  The long, drawn-out set-up for a sequel is particularly unnecessary.  It’s a shame too because the scenes of her luring the awestruck men to their impending doom had potential.    

At least we have Franco Fuckin’ Nero turning up as a menacing looking sailor who warns the friends, “That island is drenched in blood!”  He also gets a USS Indianapolis-type monologue about losing his men on an ill-fated voyage.  Eventually, he gets quite a bit of screen time near the very end, but even then, his talents are wasted in this stinky fish tale.

AKA:  Killer Mermaids.  AKA:  Nymph.  AKA:  Mamula. 

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: THE BLACK CAT (1989) ***

(Streamed via YouTube)

Directed by Luigi Cozzi (who also served as one of the many uncredited directors in yesterday’s movie, Vampires in Venice), The Black Cat originally began life as the proposed final installment of Dario Argento’s Three Mothers Trilogy.  Once he left the project, Cozzi got ahold of the script, rewrote it, and turned the Three Mothers movie into a prospective film-within-a-film.  The Argento connection doesn’t end there because in some territories, it was sold as a sequel to the Argento-produced Demons.  (Part 6, to be exact.)  If you squint hard enough, you can see the connection, thanks to the abundance of heavy metal on the soundtrack and the participation of that film’s star, Urbano Barberini. 

Anne (Florence Guerin) is an actress starring in an adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat.  Her husband, Marc (Barberini) is a director who just got hired to make the final sequel in The Three Mothers Trilogy, and he wants Anne to star as the witch, Levana.  Almost immediately, Anne starts having dreams and visions of the real Levana terrorizing her. 

Things only get weirder from there.

The Black Cat almost feels like a precursor to New Nightmare as it’s about an actress who is haunted by a character in her latest movie.  I think Cozzi was going for an Argento vibe with the use of vibrant colors during the nightmare scenes, but it winds up feeling more like a late-‘80s Elm Street sequel (especially The Dream Child), which isn’t a bad thing.  I mean Levana even has a disfigured face and razor-sharp fingernails!  Like New Nightmare, there are also some in-jokes that are amusing, like the screenwriter having a Godzilla costume in his office.  (Cozzi directed an Italian version of Godzilla in the ‘70s.) 

In terms of “quality”, the pendulum fluctuates all over the place.  It is, however, rarely boring.  Often times, it feels as if Cozzi put a mess of movies in a blender, hit the “Puree” button, and made a cinematic smoothie.  In addition to the Argento homages, we have characters spewing green vomit like The Exorcist, and a scene where guts shoot out of a TV just like in Videodrome.  Heck, Cozzi even rips off himself a couple times.  There’s a bonkers scene where a woman’s heart explodes out of her chest that looks suspiciously like leftover props from Cozzi’s Contamination, and there are lots of random cutaways to a shoddy looking starfield that look like outtakes from Cozzi’s Starcrash.

Speaking of Starcrash, that film’s star, Caroline Munro appears in a supporting role as a sexpot actress; and she’s looking quite foxy, I might add.  Brett (The Devil’s Honey) Halsey also has a brief, but memorable turn as a cranky wheelchair-bound producer.  The stars, on the other hand, are about as dull as dishwater, but that doesn’t really matter when the movie itself is so batshit insane.

I’m not saying any of this makes sense.  I’m not saying any of this is what you would call “good”.  What I am saying is that it’s fucking nuts, and for some (READ:  Me), that will be enough.

AKA:  Demons 6.  AKA:  Dead Eyes.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: VAMPIRES IN VENICE (1988) ** ½

(Streamed via Tubi)

Professor Catalano (Christopher Plummer) is an expert on vampirism who arrives in Venice looking for Nosferatu (Klaus Kinski).  It is his theory that the old bloodsucker, though he causes death and despair everywhere he goes, is secretly wishing to die himself.  It’s then up to the professor to make sure he gets his wish. 

Vampires in Venice is a sequel to Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu remake with Klaus Kinski.  You might not catch that (even if you see it under the title of Nosferatu in Venice) since Kinski refused to wear the elaborate iconic Nosferatu make-up this time out.  He also apparently fired a lot of people (which resulted in him directing part of the picture) and assaulted a few more behind the scenes. 

The presence of Plummer and Donald Pleasence help lend some much-needed class to the proceedings.  So much class that the film often meanders whenever they are not on screen.  At least it’s able to skate by virtually on Kinski’s oddball performance alone.  Even without the make-up (he still wears a set of big ass fangs), Kinski looks creepy, and he exudes a tortured state of existential weariness when saying ponderous dialogue like, “What is time in a life that never ends?”  

Despite the offscreen struggles, what occurs on screen is at least consistent visually as the film is often moody and dreamlike. While Herzog’s version looked great, it was slow and kind of dull.  The same can be said for this one, but at least it achieves a sense of otherworldly weirdness that makes it watchable.  (The gondola shots of the fog-shrouded Venice are quite atmospheric.)   

Unfortunately, “moody and dreamlike” also translates into fitfully frustrating and wildly uneven.  The third act is increasingly challenging to get through as it seems like this stretch of the film suffered the most from the backstage turmoil.  It starts to make less and less sense as it lumbers towards its inane conclusion, but at least this portion features a generous helping of nudity and at least one big unintentional guffaw (the flying scene), which almost salvages it.

AKA:  Nosferatu in Venice.  AKA:  Vampire in Venice.  AKA:  Prince of the Night.

SCREAM AND STREAM AGAIN: ZOMBIELAND: DOUBLE TAP (2019) ***

(Streamed via STARZ through Amazon Prime)

No one was really clamoring for a sequel to Zombieland, especially not a decade later.  I figured three, maybe four years tops would’ve been the lifespan for this sort of thing.  That didn’t stop the original team from getting the band back together for this slight, but highly entertaining follow-up.

Ten years after the events of Zombieland, Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Wichita (Emma Stone), and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin) take a break from killing zombies and finally put up roots at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.  Before long, Little Rock grows restless and splits to be with people her own age.  Her dysfunctional family unit then take off looking for her, unaware there has been a mutation in the zombies’ DNA, rendering them extremely hard to kill. 

As you can see, no one set out to reinvent the wheel this time out.  The plot is as basic bitch as you could get.  Even when an interesting wrinkle is thrown in (like the appearance of a Valley Girl, played by Zoey Deutsch), not much is done with it.  Most of the time, the film is simply content to rehash the old movie and coast on the charm of its actors.

Which is okay because they do a great job once again.  The core quartet play off one another effortlessly and seem to be having a blast having another opportunity to stand side by side killing zombies once again.  The newcomers to the cast are fun too.  Rosario Dawson does all the Rosario Dawson-type things you’d want to see her do.  Luke Wilson is amusingly teamed up with Thomas Middleditch, and Deutsch practically steals every scene she’s in.  If you stick around after the credits, you’ll also get a fun nod to the original that fans should really enjoy. 

To be honest, the zombies are probably the weakest element.  Although they have learned a few (OK… one) new trick since we saw them last, the zombie carnage more or less just feels like an afterthought most of the time.  In fact, you could’ve put this cast in just about any genre and it probably would’ve resulted in a decent flick.  The fact that they inhabit a zombie movie is just kind of a bonus.