HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: SKINNED ALIVE (1990) **

From producers J.R. (The Dead Next Door) Bookwalter and David (Nightmare Sisters) DeCoteau comes this sporadically entertaining low budget horror/action hybrid. 

A crazy one-eyed killer named Crawldaddy (Mary Jackson from Exorcist 3) goes around in a van killing and skinning people with her two psycho kids Phink (the late Scott Spiegel) and Violet (Susan Rothacker) in tow.  When their van breaks down, a kindly old mechanic (Lester Clark) lets them spend the night while he fixes their vehicle.  Unbeknownst to their host, the houseguests murder a delivery boy and a Jehovah’s Witness right under his nose.  When the killers eventually turn on the mechanic and his wife, it’s up to his ex-cop neighbor (Floyd Ewing, Jr.) to save the day. 

Skinned Alive features some Raimi-inspired camerawork and editing (there’s even a scene in a cellar that’s reminiscent of the Henrietta fight in Evil Dead 2), which makes sense since Spiegel co-wrote Evil Dead 2.  The gore is also decent as we get a machete through the chest, hacked off fingers, a gory bullet to the head, a body shot all to hell, gut spilling, a bayonet to the throat, and a bullet through the cheek.  It takes a while before we finally get to all the skin cutting and peeling scenes though.  While the effects of the actual flesh slicing are hit and miss, the reveal of the skinless corpse is effective. 

All of this is kind of fun when it’s focusing on the family of crazies terrorizing people, but the whole thing more or less stops on a dime once the focus switches to the alcoholic neighbor/hero character.  The stuff with his cheating wife and her scumbag lawyer just slows things down to a crawl(daddy) and the odd comic relief sound effects are really out of place with the scenes of divorce and substance abuse.  In fact, the overuse of humor throughout is more of a hindrance than anything.  The filmmakers treat the gags almost like a crutch.  It’s like they thought they could let themselves off the hook for the amateurish production values of no one took it seriously. 

Spiegel is good though.  He seems to be having fun, despite the uneven material, especially during the climax.  Rothacker is amusing too.  She gets a memorable scene where she performs a striptease for her brother where she cuts her clothes off and incorporates flayed skin in her act.  Too bad the rest of the cast overact and/or are kind of annoying. 

Clips from this later turned up in Bookwalter’s Shock Cinema series. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: THE LAST THANKSGIVING (2020) ***

A bunch of surly restaurant employees are grumpy they have to work on Thanksgiving.  Meanwhile, a cannibal family who have a long tradition of capturing, killing, and eating people on Thanksgiving (they even keep the “leftovers” locked up in the closet) show up to the diner and massacre the staff.  They then take the survivors back home for a meal around the dinner table, but who will be on the menu?

If you’ve ever been in the food service industry, you may feel a tinge of recognition here.  Little touches like customers coming in right at closing time really hit home.  It’s not Waiting… or anything, but these scenes are pretty funny.  It also helps to build sympathy for the characters, even when many of them are grouchy, foul mouthed, and bitter.  

Linnea Quigley shows up in a small role as a customer, and even though she’s the only recognizable name here, the rest of the cast are very good.  The film is short and breezy, and it doesn’t waste a lot of time getting down to business, which is appreciated.  It doesn’t set out to rewrite the book on making a holiday horror film, but it is certainly one of the better low budget efforts that have come down the chute in recent years.  The kills are fun too and show some ingenuity on an obviously low budget.  There’s burning, scalping, head splitting, a scythe through the chest, carving knife deaths, and a melting body.  We also get not one but two standout death sequences.  The first is a death by whisk and the second is a decapitation by dishwasher, both of which might be cinematic firsts. 

I will say that some of the editing is a little confusing in the climax, but it’s not enough to ruin the fun.  There is at least one inventive transition scene during this stretch of the film, so that helps.  The twist ending is solid too, even if they don’t have much time to properly flesh it out.  Small quibbles aside, The Last Thanksgiving is a feast for fans of low budget holiday horror flicks. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: TRAILERS #20: HORROR/SCI-FI (1992) ***

Here’s yet another in a long line of Something Weird compilations of horror and Science Fiction trailers.  This one focuses on the films of the ‘60s and ‘70s.  Things kick off with an ad for Crazy Music, which is just an odd retitling of Dr. Seuss’s The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T.  Fans of weird alternate titles will enjoy the trailer for The 4D Man, which also appears here as Master of Terror. 

The trailer for William Castle’s 13 Frightened Girls is kind of fun as it’s advertised as starring thirteen beauty contest winners from around the world.  Speaking of gimmicks, theater owners force patrons to sign a “Certificate of Assurance” before seeing The Corpse Grinders to state that they are of “sound mind and body”.  (But would you really be of sound mind and body if you were going to see a Ted V. Mikels movie?)  The best gimmick featured here though is the free Rasputin beard giveaway to those who attend a double feature of Rasputin, the Mad Monk and The Reptile!

While we are on the subject of Hammer, they are well-represented with the likes of The Gorgon, Prehistoric Women, Five Million Years to Earth, and Twins of Evil.  On the other side of the pond, AIP has quite a showcase of trailers too, including The Food of the Gods, Squirm, and Futureworld.  There aren’t many Japanese trailers here (although we do get one for Godzilla vs. Megalon), but The Human Vapor gets my vote for best tagline of the bunch with:  “Is he man or astro-man?”  (The Gorgon gets second place with:  “No one looked upon her face and lived!”)

Since the majority of the trailers come from the ‘60s, they are a little on the tame side.  Only The Flesh and Blood Show shows off some skin, and The Gore Gore Girls gives us glimpses of gore.  The previews are shown in chronological order, so they do get a little bit more graphic as they go along.  That said, there are a lot of ads for PG rated flicks here. 

I think my favorite trailer was for Voodoo Heartbeat.  That’s mostly because I just watched the movie earlier in the week.  Still, it was a pretty rad addition. 

The complete line-up is as follows:  Crazy Music, The Dead One, Battle Beyond the Sun, 13 Frightened Girls, The Human Vapor, The Gorgon, Master of Terror, a double feature of Rasputin, the Mad Monk and The Reptile, Prehistoric Women, They Came from Beyond Space, Five Million Years to Earth, Superargo vs. Diabolicus, Nightmare in Wax, Twins of Evil, The Corpse Grinders, Voodoo Heartbeat, Vampire Circus, The Flesh and Blood Show, Werewolf of Washington, The Gore Gore Girls, The Thirsty Dead, Disciples of Death, Old Dracula, The Food of the Gods, Godzilla vs. Megalon, Squirm, Futureworld, At the Earth’s Core, Carrie, King Kong (1976), Rattlers, The Island of Dr. Moreau, Meat Cleaver Massacre, Piranha, Halloween, and Alligator. 

HOW TO SUCCEED WITH GIRLS (1964) * ½

Pete (Paul Leder, who went on to direct A*P*E) is a womanizing asshole.  Harvey (Leon Schrier) is a pushover who is always daydreaming about women.  Pete also happens to be banging Harvey’s wife.  One night, Pete meets Harvey in a bar and decides to take him out for a night on the town to show him how to pick up women. 

I saw a trailer for this a while back on a trailer compilation called Twisted Sex Vol. 2 where it was advertised under its alternate title, The Peeping Phantom.  Well, it’s not twisted and there’s very little sex in it.  There is also no peeping or any phantoms either.  It’s pretty much an overstuffed mess, but it’s the kind of overstuffed mess that makes for a great trailer since you can make it look like a classic by using brief clips of choice moments.  When these scenes play out within the context of the movie though, they kind of get lost in the shuffle since the whole thing is so scattershot. 

The movie is novel in that the “real” segments are in black and white while Harvey’s daydreams are in color.  These daydreams are the only thing worth a damn in the entire movie.  The first and best takes place in a mad scientist lab with Pete wearing masks of various Universal monsters.  The others involve Harvey rescuing his busty secretary from a sultan’s harem, appearing as a cowboy in a Wild West cathouse, and as a United Nations ambassador.  This scene isn’t bad as Harvey watches in delight as all the other ambassadors (all played by hot women) settle their differences with a big clothes-ripping catfight.  However, the movie really needed more scenes of this caliber. 

Even then, the fantasy sequences, while they feature a few scantily clad women, are all tease and no please.  The Benny Hill-style fast-forward and rewind scenes of women running around aren’t very funny either.  The “real” world scenes are a total drag though and are often painful to watch.  It doesn’t help that a little of Leder’s loutish character goes a long way. 

Yes, that’s future Golden Girl Rue McClanahan as Pete’s ex-girlfriend.  She’s one of the few bright spots, even if she isn’t given anything to do.  She does get a skinny-dipping scene, but we only see bits of her bare back and leg. 

Screenwriter (and director of Baby:  Secret of the Lost Legend) B.W.L. Norton later collaborated with Leder for the immortal I Dismember Mama.  

AKA: The Peeping Phantom. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: SHIVER ME TIMBERS (2025) **

This is the second public domain slasher flick I’ve seen this year starring Popeye.  Sure, it’s not as consistently entertaining as Popeye’s Revenge, but it has its moments.  

The year is 1986 and people are anxiously awaiting the arrival of Halley’s Comet.  A group of teens hang out and party on the beach hoping to get a glimpse of the comet.  When it finally streaks across the sky, a scrawny old sailor accidentally smokes a bit of the comet in his pipe (I guess there wasn’t any contaminated spinach around) and he turns into a musclebound killer. 

Things kick off with a nice little homage to the opening of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.  Characters also quote Ferris Bueller, Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein, and Army of Darkness.  However, it takes more than referencing other movies to make a compelling one of your own.  It’s also annoying that the characters talk about horror movies but in the way that today’s kids do.  I mean even though it’s set in the ‘80s, nobody really looks, dresses, or acts like they came out of that decade.  It just feels… off.

Another issue is that the filmmakers don’t really take advantage of Popeye.  He resembles the character we all know and love (although he’s curiously lacking his trademark forearms) and says, “I yam what I yam” and “Well, blow me down”, but that’s about it.  Hell, he doesn’t even eat spinach.  I did like that the hot goth girl was named Olive Oyl though. 

At least the gore is plentiful, which makes it worth sitting through.  Popeye puts his fist through a guy’s face, tosses another into a vat of toxic waste, and crushes a teen’s head.  The standout death comes when he rips off a dude’s head and shits down his neck… literally.  The over-the-top ending that owes more than a little to Army of Darkness is fun, but it’s ultimately too little too late.  It also doesn’t help that the CGI blood and effects are mostly awful.

Even the short running time is a mixed blessing as the film is often choppy, and the pacing is erratic.   You also have to sit through long scenes of the teens partying and tripping balls.  The set-up for a sequel could work though.  That’s only if the filmmakers learn to embrace the quirkiness of the character and utilize him to his full potential. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: SCREAMBOAT (2025) ** ½

This is the second public domain slasher flick I’ve seen starring Mickey Mouse.  This one is from Steven LaMorte, the director of The Mean One and features that film’s star, David Howard (Art the Clown) Thornton as Mickey.  While it is a step up from that flick, it never quite lives up to its potential. 

After an inspirational quote from “Walt D.”, the plot begins.  People aboard the Staten Island ferry are being picked off one by one by a whistling minuscule murderous mouse named Screamboat Willie (Thornton).  Among the doomed passengers are a bunch of women having a birthday party who are dressed up as Disney princesses.  This is probably the most inspired touch in the movie, and some of the in-jokes are pretty funny.  (At one point, Ariel says, “I wanna be where the people are!”)

The gore is pretty good too.  A nose is bit off, a person gets stabbed through the head, there are decapitations, a pretty good double kill involving a forklift, a broomstick through the throat, electrocution, head crushing, spearing, face melting, and immolation.  The standout moment is when Willie cuts off a guy’s dick mid-blowjob.  Uncle Walt would be proud. 

All of this is fun up to a certain point.  (I liked the moment that cribbed from Deep Blue Sea.)  The problem is the bloated running time.  There’s no reason a slasher movie based on a public domain cartoon character needs to be one-hundred-and-two minutes long.  Heck, seventy-two minutes would’ve been pushing it.  Having not one but two characters playing up to the title mouse’s affections in the third act was a bit much too. 

Making Willie a small mouse (he’s about the size of a stuffed animal) was kind of an odd choice.  It doesn’t help that some of the forced perspective shots to make him look tiny don’t really work.  They should’ve just made him a human-sized character; logic be damned. 

Day of the Dead’s Jarlath Conroy gets the best line of the movie while relating Screamboat Willie’s origin story:  “Things get recycled over and over again.  It saves money!”

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: SCREAMTIME (1984) ** ½

I always try to sneak in an anthology horror flick during The 31 Days of Horror-Ween/Halloween Hangover.  I’m especially a sucker for one from the ‘80s.  While not exactly a memorable addition to the subgenre, Screamtime is nevertheless a breezy way to kill eighty-nine minutes. 

In the wraparound segments (***) a couple of friends steal some horror tapes from a video store on 42nd Street.  The movies wind up being the “stories” that make up the anthology.  It’s kind of a neat wraparound for something like this.  I just wish the camera stayed a bit longer on the old theater marquees and on the shelves of the video store.  While these segments are short, they manage to tie everything together in a fun way at the end. 

The first tale (** ½) is about an old puppeteer who is perpetually henpecked by his wife and picked on by his crazy stepson.  Shortly after the punk kid sets fire to his puppets, people who’ve wronged the puppeteer begin dying.  But who’s getting revenge?  The puppets, or the puppeteer?  This is a solid if unspectacular little chiller.  The close-ups of the puppets during the murder scenes are fairly effective even if the kills themselves aren’t all that great.  While the set-up is sound, the finale ends abruptly.  Overall, it’s not bad though. 

The next story (** ½) revolves around a married couple who are gifted a rundown old house.  Before long, the wife is seeing ghost kids playing in the backyard and finding bloody knives in the kitchen.  She gets in contact with a kooky psychic (“Some of my best friends are ghosts!”) who unfortunately is unable to help.  This one starts off slow, and while it suffers from some unnecessary stalling tactics, the ending works rather well. 

The final segment (**) is about a young handyman who goes to work for a pair of eccentric old women who have a bunch of garden gnomes in their yard.  When he sees how much money the ladies keep around, the handyman decides to rip the place off.  Little does he know the gnomes also act as a deadly means of home security.  While no means “bad”, this tale suffers from similarities to the first story (young hooligans doing wrong to elderly people who have diminutive creatures defending them).  I’ll admit, the sight of a little person dressed as a garden gnome attacking people is pretty funny.  However, the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink ending (which includes a nod to Carrie and a zombie attack) is way too uneven to be successful. 

Due to their very nature, horror anthologies tend to be uneven.  Screamtime is surprisingly consistent in terms of quality from story to story.  The biggest difference is that the tales feature a British cast and the wraparounds star Americans.  (One of our American couch potatoes says, “This is a British movie!  I can tell by the way they talk!”)