THE CURSE OF DOCTOR WOLFENSTEIN (Teaser trailer!)

Remember how I raved on about Marc Rohnstock's NECRONOS - Tower of Doom a few years back? Well, in the words of the dead kid from the Poltergeist flicks, "THEY'RE BACK!"

Just check this sizzling hot teaser for Rohnstock's THE CURSE OF DOCTOR WOLFENSTEIN, it looks sodding brilliant in all the ways I want a German gore flick to be sodding brilliant!

Tune in to INFERNAL FILMS or go like their THE CURSE OF DOCTOR WOLFENSTEIN Facebook page to keep up to date with the progress of what looks to be another kick-ass classic from the Rohnstock camp!

I love that logo, and that trailer had me at Warning: Explicit Content - Blood and Gore - Intense Violence! 

Wither

Wither

Original title: Vittra

Directed by: Sonny Laguna & Tommy Wiklund

Sweden, 2012

Horror, 96min

Distributed by: Studio S. Entertainment 

Screw the Evil Dead remake, (which probably will be awesome); this is the one you need to pay money to see in a theatre. Why You ask, well simply because we need to make sure that more independent horror films get made, distributed and screened in this country. (As in Sweden, where I’m located). Fellow fans of genre cinema who reside overseas, (or neighbouring countries) may want to keep an eager eye open as this movie may very well be the start of Sweden’s own franchise much like the success of Norway’s Fritt Vilt (Cold Prey) movies.

A lone man, Gunnar, [Johannes Brost] walks through a dark, rainy Swedish forest. One can sense the cold dampness that encloses him. He’s almost in a panic as he calls out his daughter Lisa’s name. He continues to walk and is close to breaking down, when he spots someone crouched over what might be Lisa! They could be making out, if not for the blood! The person turns around, looks at him with pale, dead eyes, as gore pours over its teeth and out of its mouth. Gunnar raises his rifle and shoots the being in the head, but seconds later, and despite a gaping hole in the back of it’s head, it sits back up and snarls…

This is the initial attack which opens Wither, a Swedish horror film in the vein of Rec, Demons, Evil Dead and every damned generic cabin in the woods horror setup that you have seen so far. It was bound to happen sooner or later – Hugo Lilja won acclaim for his Dramatic Institute graduation short Återfödelsen (The Unliving), writer, director of the magnificent Psalm 21, Fredrik Hiller, has been trying to get his post apocalyptic zombie flick Zon261 off the ground for the last few years, (fingers crossed it will happen soon), and there’s even been a slapstick comedic, reality show meets Zombies, aired on Swedish TV in the past year; Den Sista Dokusåpan (The Last Reality Show). So the fact that Sweden finally has their first demon/zombie flick and that it’s going to play theatrically, is a welcome one.

That’s why getting the monster in the initial attack does a lot to set the tone:  dark, violent, gory and perhaps most importantly the antagonist. Horror lives off its monsters, and presenting a strong, almost unbeatable demonic zombie at the very start of the movie is a rare thing in Swedish genre. More than often, budget restricts filmmakers to keep effects at a minimum, and keep them until the last possible moment. So this is an awesome initial attack that will set a great tone from square one, giving the audience precisely what they are there for, shocks, gore, and horror!

Following an illustrated credit sequence telling the genesis of the “entity”, we are introduced to the lead characters, Albin [Patrik Almkvist] and Ida [Lisa Henni], as they sit at his parents dinner table talk about an abandoned house in the woods that the two kids are planning on taking a trip to with their mates. The eight friends – hot chicks, cool dudes - are rounded up en route to their destination, and it all plays by the book as we learn who’s who, who fancies who and where they stand in the group of friends. Keeping the Swedish tone to it, they obviously talk about the amount of booze they are going to consume during the weekend, if it would have been American, they’d have started rolling spiffs, and passing them around. They reach the house, settle in, have a quick snog and start downing the drinks. The table is set, time to shift gears… Moments later one of the chicks pees blood, starts bleeding from her mouth, goes apeshit and savagely tears the lip of one of the other girls. We’ve been around the block before, and we know that the spreading of the disease has only just begun, and the shit is about to hit the fan.

Where the movie up till now has played along the lines of convention, Scandinavian folklore comes in handy when putting a special spin on things. It’s a well used device that Scandinavian filmmakers are turning to more and more, Trollhunter, Marianne, Thale to name a few. Well Wither perhaps doesn’t tap into actual folklore, but it uses folklore to create an own mythology of their monster.  Evil forces that live under the ground, when you disturb them they take your soul and bad stuff happen. Oh, did I tell you about the trap door that leads down into the soil-floored cellar and the thing hiding in the shadows?

Without trying to be smart-asses, directors Sonny Laguna, Tommy Wiklund and co-writer David Liljeblad’s passion for the genre, and knowledge, shines through on several occasions, and it also brings an ardent enthusiasm with it that is rare these days. A lot of films run on autopilot and by the book. Wither may be somewhat generic, but it still blows the competition on the home arena way off the map. It’s a testament to the fervour of independent underdogs who make exactly the movie they want without any meddling from external parts. 

As said the setup and main narrative of Wither may not be altogether unique – then again what is these days, and I doubt that’s what the guys behind it where after originality either – but when the possession starts, and the second act picks up the pace, it really pounds it in from there on out. The last forty minutes are generic horror at its best, ferocious, intense, and could easily compete with a lot of stuff that comes in from overseas. Wither get’s in there, does its job and winds up tension as the fantastic special effects kick some serious ass. The SFX crew need to stand up and take a bow, as Swedish horror fans hail their work! Goes to show that Yngvie Malmsteen was right when he said “How can less be more? More is more!” At the end of the day it doesn’t’ matter what flaws you may spot, because it’s a fast ride, a delightfully creepy one, and certainly the most violent and gory horror flick ever made in Sweden. I welcome it with at least one open arm, as the other one has to shield my eyes from the bloodshed on screen.

My favourite pet peeve with this movie is that it uses cell phones in the middle of the woods, and against all odds – they fucking work! They also get used in a brilliant way when they have to locate possessed friends, and I love these guys for that decision. It’s great to see Johannes Brost making a return to the genre scene as he was in the legendary Besökarna – one of the Swedish horrors that really does rely on the Less is more theory, just like the smash hit Låt den rätte komma in (Let The Right One In) a few years back. Brost holds a classic helper role in the film, but even helpers have some bad days too.  

But compared to earlier attempts at making entertaining horror in Sweden, Wither is an impressive feat. It boasts what definitely are among the best special effects ever put on screen in Sweden. Prepare to be nauseated; Wither is one graphic and gory little bastard indeed. If you came for a blood drenched graphically violent horror film, then you are in the right place.

Wither will hit Swedish cinemas early 2013, and should probably reach DVD a few months after that.

No Reason

No Reason

Directed by: Olaf Ittenbach

Germany, 2010

Splatter/Horror, 74min

Distributed by: NjutaFilms

It was raining, the thunder was roaring outside the window, and my kids where wanting to watch some damned cartoon movie for the umpteenth time… patience was low, tension was in the air… but they won, the got their animated movie and I redrew to the kitchen table to with a sigh. Until I realized that this was a perfect time to stick one of those “no, you can’t see what I’m watching” movies on my laptop and get some video time put down to use.

A naked woman, who we later will come to know as Jennifer [Irene Holzfurtner], holds what appears to be an official of some sort at gunpoint. He begs for his life and tells her that he’s got a wife and child at home. She cries out that she also had a child, before they start to struggle. He beats her with a 2x4 that he’s grabbed from a pile of rubble, and she pulls the trigger of the gun, blasting bloody holes in his wide torso. She stares blankly into the void before turning the gun against her own head and pulls the trigger, sending her brain matter splashing across the screen. Now this could easily have been the climax of the film, but it’s not, this is merely the beginning and Jennifer’s death is merely the start of her torment, and the journey that will kick us head over heals.

There’s something really interesting in No Reason, something that makes me put Ittenbach in a whole new light. I’ve previously primarily seen Ittenbach’s movies as good old, German Splatter, with all the trimmings.  I’ve talked about German Splatter as a niche before, and all the traits that come with it: Demonic possession, campy acting, bodily fluids, decapitations, eye gouging’s, genital mutilation, the cynicism, the dark comedic undercurrents, and profound nihilism, child deaths -I didn’t know one could put squibs on toddlers - it’s all there. But for some reason there was more to this one than I’d noticed in earlier Ittenbach movies.

It’s possible that Ittenbach has always had these finer storytelling tricks in his work – well, I know that some of the basic ones have always been there – but I’ve never really seen them stand out like this before. No Reason (which could be somewhat of a trick title) really impressed me and definitely shined a whole new light on Ittenbach.

In short form I’d say that No Reason is a kind of Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy inspired tale where Jennifer is forced through several layers of hell – the colour codes [Red, Green, Blue, Yellow to produce a final stage] – to find the true reason for why she’s submitted to this torture.  -While in this hell, she encounters the masked man, “the black one” as he’s called in the film who also has an obvious referent to H.P. Lovecraft with that Cthulhu inspired mask he wears. There’s also moments of Nakagawa Nobuo’s Jigoku, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser, Dante’s classic descent into hell and back, and the strong colour schemes made me think of Peter Greenaway’s The Cook, The Thief, his Wife and Her Lover. I also like the way that Ittenbach poses questions about life, death and the paths that we chose as humans. It’s also these colour schemes and the choices that lie therein that determine our fates in the after world in the philosophical discussions that Jennifer and the “Black Man” have. The strict colour lighting also gives a great effect as the tremendous violence of the RED level becomes so much more profound when the whole screen is saturated in deep red, and one can’t really distinguish gore from lighting. It creates an ominous effect.

German Splatter films top trait is delicately prepared as home movie footage starts off the movie. This builds the “ordinary world” where Jennifer as a child has all the love, affection, concern that a child could possibly have, her parents have the best possible though of their child and have already dreamt up scenarios of what she’ll be when she grows up… this taints everything that we see with Jennifer from here on, as the movie starts with such positive boost of values.  It’s within the loving values of the parents dreams and ambitions for their daughter, contra what we know at the end of the movie, not forgetting the last harrowing minutes of No Reason, that showcase the wonderful cynicism that is a vital trait to the German Splatter genre!

It’s a pretty strong movie, and unlike your regular German Splatter, this one does mess around with the viewer. I’d like to call it something of an empathetic head-butt, because we have been through this decent with Jennifer and have obviously become empathetic with her. It’s odd, as this rarely happens in German Splatter where characters are restricted to a few key scenes and then packaged with wraparound carnage and death. In No Reason, Jennifer is a physical participant in every single scene, hence the automatic effect that we empathize with her… and because she’s taking this ordeal for the noble reason of being reunited with her child.  By putting her through this ordeal with an item/object/totem of desire presented as the trophy at the end, one charges the search with positive value. It’ becomes a noble quest and we can empathise with the search, we want Jennifer to be reunited, we want her to be reunited so that we can get closure to the story being told. We want her to be reunited so that we can see why the reason of her ordeal. The human mind tries per automatic to solve, understand, interpret mysteries, questions, actions and events, and we also want answers to what, why and how Jennifer ended up in this scenario.

So when the last act finally comes around Ittenbach has been playing an emotionally sadistic game with us. But it’s a good one, and I liked it a lot, which is obviously why the movie get’s a high rating than the average German splatter flick. I hope this flirtation with deeper themes holds up and that we will see more of it in the films to come.

Another favourite corner stone makes an appearance in No Reason too, Guilt! There’s a reason why Jennifer is put through her ordeal, and I’d easily write it off as guilt. She’s well aware of her deeds in the past, and that’s why she ends up where she ends up, in a nightmarish state where guilt forces her to deal with her backstory. Again, it really liked it, and it certainly put a whole new spin on the way I look at Ittenbach movies from now on.

Irene Holzfurtner, who's naked practically the whole movie, does a fantastic job as Jennifer, all the angst and torment that is associated with post-war German cinema, is channelled right through this woman. Her pain leaves an impression, and I’m thrilled to see her slated for two Ittenbach films this year. Where the hell have the Germans been hiding this woman? The movie also features a last scene cameo from New Zealander Timothy Balme, who you should recall from Peter Jackson’s Braindead.

I have to tip the hat to editor Jonathan Martens’ disruptive and eclectic editing. Normally the whole philosophy of editing is to never let the audience feel, or become aware of the cuts, as it interrupts the flow. Being a former editor myself, I personally hate sloppy editing, as it’s quite often just a testament to idle hands. But when used as a style, a trait or a gimmick that works in favour of the movie, I’ll hail it unconditionally. After all, rules are written in order to be broken. So where the norm would crave straight continuous edits, No Reason, goes for the complete opposite when depicting hell and the blitzkrieg of edits really push the movie into hard terrain. With the deconstructive, flow interrupting style of edits the experience of watching the movie becomes even more uncomfortable.

No Reason stands out amongst German Splatter. Within it’s realm it’s innovative, yet stays true to the traits that define the niche. The colour codes are an attention-grabbing device and one could presume that this is Ittenbach paying homage to the lighting schemes of Mario Bava and Dario Argento’s Suspiria. You need no reason to like the movies of Olaf Ittenbach. Really you don’t, you take them for exactly what they are, delirious pieces of violent cinema, with some outrageous effects and a fury unlike non other. No Reason has a really interesting narrative, which I find made this a well worthy of the time spent watching it. Such is the magic of Olaf Ittenbach, the unconquered Goremeister aus Deutschland!

Abnormis

Abnormis

Directed by: Maik Ude

Horror, Splatter, 106min.

Germany, 2011

Ok, so I’ve had Maik Ude’s Abnormis safely stashed away in my pile of trash to watch at a better time since I picked it up from the man himself at the Bottrop Weekend of Horrors 2011. Along with the dedicated, signed two disc Absurd Uncut Version, (as every German release, restricted to a limited number of issues, this one 333, the other 333 with alternative cover art) I received a lighter and a t-shirt and that’s about as far as I got before my mates started hassling me for my lack of judgement and poor taste in films… oh the suffering.

Eva [Andrea Mohr] is pregnant with Chris’ [Darkun] child, but after spotting him being unfaithful with her best friend Kathrin [Divina Buran], she rushes to her car and drives out of the town at a high speed. Chris follows her in his car to give some lame excuse and try to patch things together, or at least explain himself. But, before he can catch up with Eva’s car, she’s stopped by a maniac [Sven Spannagel], the obligatory overweight semi-retard who lives out in the woods and just happens to slaughter everyone who comes along, who kidnaps her and takes her to his damp dark underground torture chamber. So you can check that one off the list of required niche traits too. Blissfully unaware, Chris turns up, knocks on the door, is yanked into the dark damp torture chamber by The Killer and the young couple’s suffering get’s under way. Back in civilization Kathrin, now missing friends, contacts private eye, Marc Blaschke [Marco Kruse] to help her find them. With the assistance of Marc, and two uninvited thugs who Marc owes large amounts of money on their tail, the bunch travel right to the mansion where not only The Killer awaits, but also a mysterious Demon with a grudge against mankind…

Basically Abnormis is a classic schoolbook example of German splatter. Cheap, gritty and to the point, in a catch them and kill them kind of way. Catch them and kill them, with that dark comedic approach which only the German Splatter niche can deliver. Andrea Mohr at times gives the impression of being bored out of her mind, instead of being scared of dying, and there’s plenty of dialogue where the word “Schlampe” is used, giving it a quirky tone. Not intentionally, but “Schlampe” was the main gag my mates and I returned to all the time after watching Violent Shit back in the day. But there’s also that dark German nihilism, which I’ve in earlier texts pointed out, is a vital ingredient in German splatter flicks.

It would be too easy to trash the fuck out of cheap low-budget horror films, especially amateur made horror films if I was to take the easy way out. Instead, I like challenging myself to find the positive within the movie, tap into the filmmakers enthusiasm and get a feel for what they where trying to do. Again, it would be way to easy to crush a film like this, and that’s why every amateur film critic tends to trash above praising. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from Abnormis, I though it would be cheesy, have dodgy effects, suffer from bad pacing and poor acting… and you know what it is rather cheesy, has dodgy effects, suffers from bad pacing and is pretty much filled with actors who couldn’t act their way out of a paper bag, but that’s also part of the game: It’s amateur horror, this is where you find the crazy shit, see how creative devotees make do with what they have and this is where enthusiasm takes first seat. Complaining about these things would be like watching amateur porn and complaining about sock marks, pale skin, bad lighting and drunk overweight wannabe actors who couldn’t stop looking into the camera.

Cannibalism, sodomy, chunky murderers, foetus yanking, well fed chicks getting naked and screaming demons all come with the unique German Niche, but what I wasn’t prepared for, was that the movie would surprised me with small, but effective beats, where I have to give credit to Ude as they result in some pretty interesting twists and turns.

The tension of setting a pregnant woman – in her vulnerable state – in the hands of a sadistic maniac is great. It undoubtedly builds up an extreme tension that you know will only end in one way. But this is where the beauty of German Nihilism and Dark Comedy come to a splendid combination – After her harrowing ordeal Eva starts to give Chris a bollocking for being such a weak man! Yeah, she compares him and his unfaithfulness to the violence of the maniac, “One broke my Heart, one broke my Baby!" and then swears that she’ll have her revenge. Oh the passion of dark German splatter, it’s a beauty isn’t it.

As you may have guessed, Eva’s revenge does come in all it’s glory when she’s comes back to haunt all who enter the mansion as the Demon, that great iconic image printed on t-shirts and DVD covers. The Demon, second only to the chubby carnage bringer, is the most featured antagonist in German splatter flicks. Hell hath no fury as a mutilated woman who’s had her baby yanked out of her womb! In some fucked up way, Eva becomes the character we empathise with, and her vengeance is ours too. Oh, and that’s when the Swat team arrive to search the house… Told you, this is where the crazy shit happens.

I really like the private eye subplot. It’s not only a way for Maik to cast himself in a small part, but also a pretty smart way to increase the number of victims at the mansion, up the body count and get some more gore effects in there. God knows we’ve all seen professional movies where people pop up out of nowhere just to be offed in the next scene. At least Ude builds some kind of credibility for his victims.

A favourite moment is when Tito the thug [Boris Klemkow] pulls his gun on Marc and shouts that he’s going to kill him for pulling him into this “shit” (read nightmare). Marc coldly screams back "Go on then, shoot me, that will leave you all alone out here with this maniac!”  

Forty minutes into the piece the “iconic” Abnormis face of the Demon is presented, and from here on the movie really takes off, bringing an investigation plot into play, but also moving from splatter and gore into a more supernatural realm too. There’s a bit of everything in here and the last ten minutes really venture into nightmarish bad trip territory, bringing the movie full circle.

I dig that Ude goes with full coverage horror and not the usual insulting “oh shit no coverage my cell phone is completely useless here” gimmick, instead, he goes all in, Chris send’s text messages to Kathrin, and even sends her an MMS from the torture dungeon.

Finally I do kind of like the score and black metal songs that Darkun and his band The Dark Unspoken  (as well as Territion) have supplied for the movie, it sure beats the usual cheap synthesiser drone and plastic orchestral tripe that comes with German Splatter films.

So yeah, Abnormis is all about cheap gore, has some fun twists, and an amateur enthusiasm that really makes this a film I enjoyed. I’d easily take a look at whatever Ude comes up with next.

Just for the record, I love my Abnormis t-shirt with Andrea Mohr’s demonic face screen-printed on it. It looks like a black metal shirt and I always get asked about it when I wear it. It’s one of my favourite t-shirts, and I’ll happily promote Ude’s film by wearing it, as that’s what drew me to their sales desk at the horror fair to start with. See, no matter whom you are, an impressive promotional image goes a long way.

The Burning Moon

The Burning Moon [QuickFix]

Directed by: Olaf Ittenbach

Germany, 1992

Horror/Splatter, 86min

Lager lout Peter [Ittenbach himself] is forced to stay at home and baby sit his little sister [Annette Arbeter] instead of roaming the streets smoking dope and getting in gang fights. But in a moment of self-destructive behaviour intent on “punishing” his parents, Peter shoots up some drugs and watches as the moon starts to burn. Then he stumbles into his sister’s room where he starts to tell her two bedtime stories… bedtime stories that focus on death, mutilation, a serial killer, a psychopathic priest and the bowels of Hell!

Movies shot on video in the early nineties have a certain look to them that reminds me of the movies my mates and I where making in the early nineties. Plot was always secondary to the effects. It was all about the effects, the violence, and the cheap gory special effects the entire production circled around. Well, that’s exactly what Olaf Ittenbach’s early movies are all about. Shallow stories primarily designed to showcase his moments of gore and splatter. The Burning Moon has some delightfully classic old school effects, body parts chopped off, dismemberments, headshots, throat slits and human torment effects which still today are impressive. Fuck you CGI, you can never mimic reality as well as enthusiasm, latex and fake blood.

Homemade effects are fun. Naïve and enthusiastic and way to exaggerated, watching low budget flicks with cgi’ed blood and splatter isn’t the same thing. Ittenbach was at an early stage in his career here, but it’s already very clear where he’s going to go with his fantastic effects. These early movies are merely appetizers for the gore fests to come, and for each film his skills improved. That not saying that these effects don’t get the job done, the last ten minutes are one goddamned insane gorefest that pus a lot of others to shame, and Ittenbach’s past as a dental technician comes in handy when one devastating scene in graphic detail shows a drill splintering it’s way through teeth, sending pieces flying in all over the place.

Anthology films are coming into craze again, what with Little Deaths, The ABC’s of Death, The Profane Exhibition and on and on and on… So making your own way back in 92 is a pretty ballsy thing to do in my book. Especially as it’s your second real movie you ever made! Both films have childhood traumas as origin stories to both killers’ rampages. Which is interesting as I find a lot of German filmmakers look to the past scars for inspiration, despite genre they are working in. It’ kind of hangs to together with the melancholic angst of early Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog, Rainer Werner Fassbinder. History comes back to haunt you.

There’s a fun moment when a victim to be is watching TV and Ittenbach’s previous, and first film Black Past 1989 is on the television. The victim to be, switches channel and says that nothing but shit on the tube. Julia [Beate Neumeyer] hides from her psychopath boyfriend behind a bathroom door, which Chris [Helmut Neumeyer] blatantly points out to her is a glass door. Another scene shows a cutaway of a blood splat over a leather-studded codpiece.  In the movies wraparound that odd German humour and dark nihilism I’ve earlier claimed to be a trait, radiates from Ittenbach’s The Burning Moon. Check out the Necronos: Tower of Doom piece for more on those traits.

I’m giving The Burning Moon a 4 out of 6 because I was in the mood for some old-school gore, and Olaf Ittenbach’s movie delivered it. He also managed to work a Jesus zombie in there too, and seen as I love depictions of hell, the vivid depictions that Ittenbach pus on screen in the last ten minutes are outlandish, and grotesquely intimidating in such a way that they would have made Lucio Fulci proud.

Here's a wonderfully dorky US trailer. Enjoy.

Necronos: Tower of Doom

Necronos: Tower of Doom

Directed by: Marc Rohnstock

Germany, 2010

127, Horror/Splatter

Distributed by: Dark Entertainment

Way back in the day… no, I mean really way back in the day, almost twenty years ago when I worked in video stores… no, not the cool chic one with Bergman and Fellini on the shelves, but the underground one, that imported uncut Greek and Dutch tapes… and the dodgy titles from Deutchland, I got my first intoxicating shot of cheap, gritty German splatter.

Hard To Get Videos of Hamburg was a kick-ass store and one of the guys who ran that strore was Steve Aquilina, actor, cinematographer and editor of Andreas Schnaas Violent Shit trilogy 1989-1999 and Zombie ’90: Extreme Pestilence 1991. We imported and traded a shit lot of tapes with those guys, so this obviously meant that the movies they made on their spare time where required viewing, and god knows we certainly sold our share of Carl the Butcher’s exploits!

A lot of blood has flown under the bridge since then, and a whole new generation of blutrünstiges gore Dämonen have been keeping the German colours dark red with the guts of unfortunate victims… and I find my self returning to it every now and again, because there is something special about cheap German gore that will always appeal to me in some dark fold of my heart. From the first time I saw Jörg Buttgereit’s Nekromantik movies, through the works of Schnaas, via the carnage of Olaf Ittenback and Marcel Walz, up to the likes of Maik Ude (oh, yeah, I’ve got his Abnormis on my shelf awaiting a viewing) and Marc Rohnstock.

Many centuries ago, the dark wizard Necronos [Thomas Sender], a powerful minion of Satan, finds himself defeated by the villagers. After raiding his castle they butcher him and rest assure that the torment and fear he brought with him was abolished forever… until several decades later when rises from the dead and swears to take his vengeance on mankind. Together with his servants Goran [Timo Fuchs] and The Witch [Manoush who also starred in Marcel Walz La petite mort 2009, also available completely uncut from Dark Entertainment.], the people of the small German village are once again being kidnapped, tortured and maimed just for the hell of it. Well they are actually being obtained and maimed as Necronos seeks out the rare ingredients he needs to create his army of Berserkers and lay the land to waste.

After a nine and a half minutes of explanatory exposition, set in medieval times – not only presenting the back story of Necronos the Wizard, but also showcasing shaved naked German chicks, a small zombie army, gruesome effects like eye gouging, a couple of decapitations, dismemberment and burnings, all impressively shot in minimalistic, but period establishing locations – Necronos brings us up to modern age with a threat of the great wizards return and revenge on mankind… and at this point I really fucking want it!

The modern age “Jason-ish burn victim stalker demon”, Goran if you are playing attention, is really effective. His mayhem set’s a tone that propels the film into darkness. Yeah, I’ve seen a lot of shitty low budget movies in my day, but there’s something with the first half hour of Necronos, which takes me back to those days of Nekromantik, and especially the first Violent Shit films. Films, which are grotesque and provocative in a naïve and violent way, but still have a dark comedic tone to them. But as said, Goran isn’t merely genre convention, he’s one of Necronos foul puppets, sent to do his evil deeds… and he’s got plenty of vile feats hidden away up his sleeve.

It’s classic splatter and gore that just keeps going on and on and on… There’s a great double beheading, and the birth of the Berserker really stands out. It’s an easy but impressive moment. I find myself chuckling at numerous moments of depravity and bedlam, in-jokes, such as Carl the Butcher’s mask hanging on the castle wall, or the faces of other German splatter directors cameos [Andreas Schnaas, Timo Rose, Marcel Walz] but mostly the profound violence of the murders. And yes, Luna B’s impalement scene is just as gag inducing as you imagined it to be when you first saw that image! It’s more or less showing everything you never saw before that iconic Cannibal Holocaust image - and now an image associated with Necronos after that Facebook scandal forcing Dark Entertainment to remove the original poster image from their wall!

Interestingly enough, and perhaps this is a German splatter trait, there’s really nobody to root for. Necronos is just like many other German genre flicks a tour de force of violent deaths and continuous carnage. It would be fair to say that the only character that we have to feel anything for is… Necronos… Yeah the Wizard! He’s the only one with anything to gain in the movie, the only one with an assigned task – collect the souls, prepare the apocalypse, bring death to all. But then Rohnstock hurls us a fast one. A delightful curve ball in the shape of Lucy [Tanja Karius who also had a victim part in La petite mort, which also saw director Marc Rohnstock in a small part!] In his scheming, Necronos needs to find the “Chosen one”, the one with impure flesh, in other words a virgin, as all the previous women The Witch has led him towards have all been whores! Necronos words not mine. Although the Lucy character and her subplot boyfriend, are red herring’s and the focus soon shifts from Lucy to Michelle [Saskia Neumueller]. Blam, at last there’s something to root for in this movie – not that that’s a bad thing. Michelle is aided by previously captured, but now escapee David [Mario Zimmerschitt]… and finally there’s a value at stake. The future of mankind lies in the hands of David and Michelle! This may be unconscious or deliberate by Rohnstock and company, but throwing the audience a bone this late in – as a good part of three quarters have played out – is menacing, and malicious as it sets us up the punch of the gloomy ending which is about to come!

Just like the films of Buttgereit and Schnaas, the movie does have a few quirky laughs stowed away in its narrative… I’m no gourmet of German comedy, but it’s there and I suppose it gets the job done. Perhaps it’s this German humour that plays its most important part in the scenes between Necronos, Goran, the Witch and the Devil… It’s stiff and every scene ends with Necronos turning his back against the camera and returning to his sinister plan. After a while it becomes comedic. But I’ll write it up as a second trait that defines their niche, and perhaps the German indie splatter scene is the one that is closest to the original Sam Rami Evil Dead flicks. Movies that where terrifying, filled with violence but at the same time fun… although with the main detail being that despite the fun, they never once let us catch out breath, and they where dark as hell. There’s no happy ending in the Evil Dead movies, nor is there happy endings in German splatter.

What impresses me the most is the familiar German nihilism mentioned above… Just like the films of his counterparts, Marc Rohnstock’s Necronos takes no prisoners. It get’s in there, stirs the shit, drowns it’s audience in tsunamis of blood, lures them in, presents false hope and then finally kicks the viewer in the balls with it’s dark depressing, but humoristic ending… an ending I find to be very typical German Splatter.

Just for the record, if your girlfriend is preggers then please don’t show her Necronos… after all, what Goran does to the expecting woman and unborn child in this movie will leave you both scarred forever! We don’t want that now, do we? Because Necronos is a gore drenched orgy of depravity and viciousness that requires your attention… a two hour epic, which never looses pace or feels slow, but instead oozes of the joy, enthusiasm and passion for filmmaking that Marc Rohnstock, his crew and cast have brought to their movie. Sometimes a big goofy gore movie is just a big goofy gore movie and you need to sit your ass down and simply enjoy the ride! I did, and I loved every minute of it!

Necronos is available HERE, from the brave and majestic warriors of Dark Entertainment. It’s totally uncut, looks fucking awesome, and for your viewing pleasure the disc even sports English subtitle track!

(Oh, and if you are a true collector, you need to pick up all their titles to get the secret message that the spines will eventually spell out!)

Here's a censored trailer, get the real deal here.