Movie Review: Evils of the Night (1985)

Evils of the Night Directed by Mardi Rustam, starring Tina Louise (1985).

"Space aliens enlist the aid of garage mechanics to procure local beach bunnies for blood transfusions and life extension experiments". 

While the above comes off like a droll TV Guide-styled parody of a grade-Z science fiction film, such a movie exists: Mardi Rustam's notorious Evils of the Night! Bad lighting, bad editing, inane plot, bottom-of-the-barrel costumes and humiliated movie and TV stars are dropped into the stew for a feature that has to be seen to be disbelieved.

After a twirling disco light lands at a nearby lake, said space aliens (Carradine, Louise and Newmar) abetted by some outer space lesbians, who hold hands and look knowingly into each other’s eyes -- commandeer a nearby hospital and begin to thin out the area's local youths. Paying two local grease monkeys (Brand and Ray) in gold coins to abduct the area's bimbos and stud muffins for unwilling test subjects, Carradine, Louise and Carradine begin a series of vampiric blood transfusions. The majority Evils of the Night literally takes place in a garage, adding yet another level of threadbare production value.

yeah but it's not just any garage, it's the cheapest in town!

Evils of the Night enjoyed a limited theatrical release in the waning days of the Drive-In and grindhouse. Its cult reputation would arrive once released to VHS, where drunken frat boys would chug beers, roll their eyes to exclaim, “Look, its Catwoman and Ginger from 'Gilligan's Island!' What the hell happened?” While he's listed low on the credits, disgraced actor Aldo Ray has a lot of screen time. A onetime matinee idol, Ray's name alone on a VHS box at that would serve as fair warning to keep on walkin', back in the day.

I need some more of that medical shit to endure this movie Bob! 

Where to begin? Aforementioned pros such as Carradine, Brand and company are inter-cut with adult video stars Amber Lynn, Shone Taylor, Crystal Breeze and Jerry Butler in some scene of nudity and soft-core grouping in the service of a slasher missing chase scenes. The gory climax is set in the aforementioned claustrophobic garage as the terrified teens mete out justice on their tormentors with electrical power tools. The end ….

can I get some of that poofy 80's hair cream rinse, I'm addicted!

Director Mardi Rustam, the producer of Tobe Hooper's Eaten Alive, reunited with that film's madman, Brand, to make something … memorable. Vinegar Syndrome's combo Blu-ray/DVD package is a vast improvement in audio and visual quality over the title's previous incarnations on VHS and DVD, but can't deter from the movie's countless indifferently framed and overly lit scenes.
Among the Vinegar Syndrome disc's many extras is the nine-minute mini-documentary “Alien Blood Transfusion.” Aged director Rustam, in a halting tone shares stories behind the making of the film. Rustam claims that one of the main inspirations behind Evils of the Night is The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), a distinction it shares with that other woebegone alien invasion epic, Plan Nine from Outer Space (1959)! Shot on location in Agoura Hills and Malibu, this tidbit doesn't explain – with so many abundant beach locations nearby, why Evils of the Night takes place around a very stagnant lake surrounded by ugly, overgrown shrubbery. Rustam ends his chat by saying that he's going to sit down and rewatch the film for the first time in many years.

Other extras include optional English subtitles for the hard of hearing, as well as an isolated audio track featuring the soundtrack music and “new wave” songs of composer Robert O. Ragland. Even more substantial is a 93-minute version intended for television markets that appears a bit too racy to show before 11 p.m. on independent TV stations. There are also 24 minutes of outtakes, a TV spot and an incomplete, rough-cut theatrical trailer to round out the package. 

Whether approaching the title with bemused nostalgia or with fresh, astonished eyes, Evils of the Night is sure to leave many experiencing A Good Time with a Bad Film. 

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Movie Review: Lisa, Bright and Dark

Lisa, Bright and Dark
Directed by Jeannot Szwarc, Starring Kay Lenz (1973).

Movie review by Greg Goodsell

This “Kindertrauma” favorite had all my fellow classmates in junior high talking about it the day it was telecast on November 28, 1973. Lisa, Bright and Dark had some strong shocking content for its day and innumerable links to the horror genre as well. We will get to this in a moment …

When we first meet Lisa (Kay Lenz), she appears to be just yet another spoiled rich kid whiling away her senior year before embarking on to her college years. Her mom (Anne Baxter) and dad (John Forsythe) are terribly conservative and wealthy, although they seem a bit old to have a 17-year-old daughter. Straight away, things begin to go awry. Subject to mood swings, she tells off her steady boyfriend Brian at a party in front of a bunch of her fellow students, only to re-emerge minutes later smiling and friendly. Something is drastically wrong however. After a shopping spree collecting the latest “Marcia Brady” drag, she forces her way into the car of a complete stranger. Lisa then decides her clothes are too young for her and sets them alight in the car! Imagine all that melted polyester meeting that ugly plaid interior!

YICCHH I shudder at those bad 70's fashions

Things are spiraling wildly out of control for our deluded female student, and a trio of her friends (TV standbys Anne Lockhart, Debralee Scott and Jamie Smith-Jackson) decide to form their own “group therapy” session. Poring over a few “self-help” books from the library, along with some practical experience – “I was in analysis for three years!” one of her friends declares, Lisa’s “hen group” tries to bring her back to a semblance of normalcy, but things only go from bad to worse.

Lisa, Bright and Dark is at its heart a low-to-no budget telefilm with ghastly fashions, but remains highly relevant today. Mental illness remains highly stigmatized in the United States today, and many young women may find themselves in a home situation where the parents and guardians refuse to acknowledge it as it reflects negatively on them. There is also an anti-psychiatrist bias as well. High school guidance counselors, unable to deal with the complexity of teenagers, often reach for the mantra of “Your child needs professional help …” whether it be for nail biting or multiple personality disorder. Not helping the situation are contemporary mental health professional themselves, who glibly prescribe “happy pills” for patients in lieu of addressing their root problems.

Did you get that audition for the Brian Depalma Catsup commercial?

Lisa, Bright and Dark has many connections with the horror genre, with scenes calling to mind films of that era. The scene where Lisa douses herself with red paint in art class prefigures Sissy Spacek in Carrie (1976), as well as a scene where she throws herself through a plate-glass window in the manner of Marilyn Burns in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). (A scene where Lisa carves her name in her arm with a straight pin calls to mind the excesses of recent “torture porn” films as well.)

WRONG! It's spelled SLAYER!

Director Jeannot Szwarc is no stranger to horror film fans, directing William Castle’s Bug (1975) as well as the most horrifying Night Gallery TV episode, “The Caterpillar.” He is also the man responsible for such fan favorites as Jaws 2 (1978) and Somewhere in Time (1980), and remains active in television in the present day.

Hey can you drive me over to the set of Match Game, I'm pretty stoned

As for Lisa, she does “get help” at the end of the film, but we are left with the definite impression that she’s currently pushing a shopping cart and picking through Dumpsters. Overall, Lisa, Bright and Dark still packs a punch and raises many questions that have yet to be addressed in current society.   

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Crash!

Crash! Directed by Charles Band, Starring Jose Ferrer (1977). 

Review by Greg Goodsell

Before he hit pay dirt with an entire motion empire predicated on tiny, stop-motion figures wreaking havoc with his Puppetmaster and related films, Charles Band began his career with some extremely grimy, unrelenting, downbeat horror pictures that more than any other defined the genre that was dubbed “grindhouse.” When this reviewer is asked what the sleaziest motion picture he has ever seen, I invariably say Band’s Mansion of the Doomed (1976). Don’t laugh – there’s something about that film that worms its way under my skin. Dark, grim and relentless, there’s something about that dime store variation of Eyes Without a Face (1960) – with its cellar full of eyeless human guinea pigs that can’t be denied. Adding to the oppressive atmosphere is the presence of down-at-their-heels Hollywood has-beens Richard Widmark and Gloria Grahame wishing they were anywhere else.

Hey Chuck you left out Mansion, but included Evil Bong, really? 

Crash!, Band’s first film, while not reaching the gory heights of Mansion still has plenty of darkness and ill will bubbling underneath. Never released to video and DVD until just recently, Crash! is beyond ridiculous and borrows heavily from the many films that preceded it – The Car (1977), especially, but maintains viewer interest throughout.

The film open with a driverless black convertible driving a hippie van off the road, whereupon a stoner dude and his girlfriend are killed in a fiery, apocalyptic explosion. This goes on for awhile, satisfying the audience’s innate need for vehicular destruction. It makes perfect sense that author J. G. Ballard penned a novel with the same name that later became the main cornerstone in director David Cronenberg’s oeuvre of psychosexual films in 1996. Ideas that are far more pungent will be visited upon the yahoos in search of Band’s film who pick up Cronenberg’s picture by mistake.

Fulci's lawyers are on the phone as we speak!

Here comes the funny part: Sue Lyon (Stanley Kubrick’s titular siren Lolita, 1962) is seen shopping at a flea market at a drive-in theater (once again tying the picture to its target audience, as well as another facet of American car culture) where she buys an ugly one-idol pagan idol keychain from horror film icon Reggie Nalder (Salem’s Lot, 1979). She returns home to her bitter, wheelchair bound husband Jose Ferrer who forbids her to leave the house. Disregarding hubbie’s directive, Lyon jumps into her black convertible – the same one seen in the beginning killing various motorists. A snarling black Doberman pinscher jumps into car (the same one used in Dracula’s Dog, 1978), and forces her off the road. Injured and amnesiac, she’s rushed to a nearby hospital still clutching the demonic keychain.


Natch, the keystone is an ancient evil spirit, which is subconsciously used by Lyon to send her black convertible on a random spree of death and destruction. The question immediately arises … why was her car going on a murder spree before she lucked into the malefic keychain? The movie certainly doesn’t say …  

I think someone stuck some microdots onto my Dunkin Munchkin

There’s not much too it from there on in. Lyon slowly regains her memory with the assistance of kindly Dr. Gregg Martin (John Ericson) and the car continues its war against humanity. Ferrer pops in and gets hip to the fact that satanic forces are being rallied against him – and in a scene quite tasteless, and therefore daring for an exploitation film – Ferrer’s wheelchair is telekinetically used to batter the Doberman pinscher to death. 

WELL, the DVD is packed with extras, the best one being a documentary on tighty-whitey auteur director David DeCouteau love affair with the film. The film’s relative unavailability – DeCouteau caught it one weekend at a crummy theater, never to catch it again on VHS, TV or DVD led to his scavenger hunt for memorabilia. Certainly, the poster is one of the GREATEST ever for an exploitation film – a veritable doomsday of colliding automobiles with scantily dressed women running for their lives ties it once again to the Gospel of Cars, Sex and Death as preached by Ballard and Cronenberg.

While the enthusiasm behind this rare film is evident on the DVD, one has to wonder what Lyon and Ferrer thought about the direction of their lives and careers at the point they signed on for the project.

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Smile Before Death

Smile Before Death, aka “Il sorriso della iena” Directed by Silvio Amadio, Starring Jenny Tamburi (1972).

Movie Review by Greg Goodsell

In this sleazy murder mystery, we see rich old bag Dorothy Emerson (Zora Gheorgieva) flail about on the floor of her parlor, her throat slit with a piece of jagged glass. Detectives note that ol’ Dorothy had been drinking heavily before her demise, and so they describe as an “apparent suicide.” As we learn much later, this ridiculous assumption was probably based on the fact that Dot was an overbearing old hose bag who the surrounding community exclaimed “Good riddance!” when they wheeled her lifeless body on the gurney. However, we are getting ahead of ourselves –

Dorothy’s daughter Nancy (Jenny Tamburi) arrives at the family manse, school cap, knee socks and all. In boarding school for the majority of her life, she says she only saw mom about seven to eight times in her entire life (This figures in to plot later on, takes note.) Nancy is greeted by lesbian lizard Gianna (Rosalba Nelbi), “her mother’s best friend” – HA! – and scumbag stepfather Marco (Silvano Tranquilli). Dorothy kept no pictures of daughter nancy anywhere in the house and both Gianna and Marco rarely heard of her … do we see where this is going?

mirror mirror on the wall, do I look like a porn parody version Gina Gershon? 

In no time, shutterbug Gianna has Nancy posing for a series of pictures. Beginning with relatively innocuous fashion shots, the photos sessions become increasingly steamy and more explicit. Eventually, these modeling sessions include a third party, Connie Linglus. OOOOoh, you saw that one coming, didn’t you friends?

I saw that one coming but am incapable of smiling

To cut to the chase, it’s later revealed that Cougar Woman Dorothy was a happy lush who embraced life with her Bobby Sherman-lookalike boyfriend (Hirma Keller) who was fixing to tell both Gianna and Marco to hit the road. Natch, they both killed Dorothy, and tried to make it look like a suicide by locking her up in her bedroom from the inside by using a piece of twine. When faithful house servant Magda (Dana Ghia) gets hip to the Disgusting Duo’s plans – to eventually kill Nancy to get their hands on all the loot, she is brutally dispatched by Gianna with a glass ashtray. 

Not surprisingly, Nancy isn’t who she’s supposed to be – a minor character makes a reappearance – and a throwaway bit at the beginning involving a traffic blind spot and a garden arbor likewise returns for a grisly surprise ending that will have you laughing for days!

They don’t make them like this anymore, and did they ever? Set in one location, crammed full of Seventies disco décor that fetches top dollar on Internet auction sites, Smile Before Death features a jazz soundtrack from vocalist Edda Dell'Orso, frequent Ennio Morricone collaborator. It’s a catchy tune that lasts under three minutes and is played over and over and over and over again, even when it’s not supposed to. 

Director Silvio Amadio’s previous giallo feature Amuck (1972) remains highly sought after. In the meantime, slice off some smelly Italian cheese at the black-gloved buffet with Smile Before Death!

Movie Review: Medusa (2015)

"THE ENCHANTRESS COMETH!" bellows auteur Jorge Ameer, as Kao.

Directed by Jorge Ameer, Starring Jeff Allen (2015).

Review By Greg Goodsell

Director-writer-Actor Jorge Ameer’s last horror/science-fiction project, D’Agostino (2012) was set in Greece. His latest feature, Medusa, based on the Greek legend of the Gorgon, is set in Southern California. Huh? That’s just one of the many things that don’t make an awful lot of sense in this horror thriller that combines minimalism, ad-libbed dialogue and claustrophobic settings for a most unique viewing experience.

Dr. Jack Peruci (Jeff Allen) is an academic specializing in mythology. He’s on his way to claim a magical mirror, which as one character puts it, “looks like a clock.” Disregarding warnings from his girlfriend Lana (Britt Rose), Peruci drives out into the forest to an isolated cabin. Meeting the flamboyant Kao (played by Ameer), the thobe-dressed mystic – recalling equal amounts of Boy George and the kind of TV horror movie host that one encounters on public access TV, offers to sell the mirror for $5,000. Peruci makes away with the mirror Scott free, in what can only be called a “Thrift Score” of the most deadly kind.

Candles, set the mood, don'tcha think?

Returning to his cramped, claustrophobic apartment – your reviewer has had walk-in closets that were more spacious. Things start to turn sour for Peruci. He falls ill with a high fever and has nightmares about the Gorgon goddess, Medusa. Peruci’s best friend, psychologist Steven Craig (Tom Struckhof) is skeptical. “Why do you believe in the myth of Medusa? That’s why they call it a myth!” he opines over lunch one day. Peruci is dead set that his recent find is authentic and offers a gateway to a new realm of human understanding.

Now, tell me about your initial misgivings during your latency period while you were seven years old ....

In the meantime, academics at the unnamed college where Peruci teaches want to pull his funding. They’re understandably upset: They’ve been stringing him along all this time and all Peruci has to show for himself is distressed, Victorian mirror to show for himself! (Believe it or not, there are lots of true-to-life academic funding and government grants that have produced far, far less!) These three gentlemen are likewise rendered in a stark, minimalist fashion. Three folding chairs in a dark room EVEN SMALLER than Peruci’s apartment. A projector shows a twirling Zodiacal sign to add an appropriately occult atmosphere.

More supernatural shenanigans at Peruci’s place ensue. Telephones ring, and distorted voices are heard on the line. Tremors shake his modest apartment, and yet Peruci’s knick- knacks fail to fall from the table. Sounds just like a quiet night in Southern California’s Earthquake Country to us: Being pestered by robo-callers with a sudden, run-of-the-mill temblor to jar the evening’s quiet.

Jorge Ameer also appeared as the Buttinski neighbor in D'AGOSTINO.

In one benighted night at Peruci’s apartment, Steven is pulled into a spare bedroom by a glowing video effect but later emerges none the worse for wear. There is a final confrontation where Ameer and company reach into the cheap, in-camera special effects bag-o’-tricks and then it’s all over.

Things are going to hit the fan very shortly in MEDUSA.

Ameer is a lot of fun as the flamboyant Kao, mugging hysterically for the last row in the opera house, giving a necessary burst of energy that’s gone all too quickly. Overall, Medusa features punchy jump scares and is extremely entertaining. Give this one a spin.

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TUSK

TUSK   

USA, Canada, 2014. D: Kevin Smith

Reviewed by Greg Goodsell

Odious radio shock jock Wallace Bryton (Justin Long), of the “Not-See Party” (get it?) plans a trip to Canada in order to interview the subject of an Internet viral video. Said notorious clip depicts a nerdy teen demonstrating his Samurai sword skills, accidentally slicing a leg off in the process! Taking the trip solo to the Great White North, Bryton finds that the teen has taken his own life out of humiliation. Hating to go home empty-handed, Bryton takes note of an ad posted in a bar restroom. An eccentric old recluse, Howard Howe (Michael Parks) is looking for someone to share his mansion for free room and board, adding that he has interesting life experiences to share for that special someone. Bryton takes the bait, and meets up with Howe at his rural, gloomy manse. Regaling Bryton with his experiences as a young sailor, Howe has drugged his guest's drink. When Bryton next wakes he finds himself bound to a wheelchair – and one of his legs has been amputated (in bizarre retribution for the planned exploitation of his suicidal interview subject)! Howe informs him that the happiest time of his life was when he survived a shipwreck and was lovingly cared for by a male walrus who kept him from the cold by concealing him in his blubber. Long is to become a human walrus, following extensive, homemade surgery ….

Meet Wallace the Walrus

Transformed into a hulking, barely mobile human walrus after Parks' handiwork – a truly horrific and hilarious makeup effect, chillingly achieved by Robert Kurtzman, Bryton is kept in a macabre aquarium where he soon learns that other would-be houseguests have fallen prey to Parks' brutal ministrations. In the meantime, Bryton’s radio cohort Teddy Craft (Haley Joel Osment) and Bryton’s girlfriend Ally (Genesis Rodriguez) enlist the aid of an alcoholic French-Canadian detective Guy LaPointe (Johnny Depp in a delightful bit of dialectical comedy on par with Peter Sellers) who has encountered similar, perplexing unsolved murders. The trio, after a successful series of deductive reasoning close in on Howe’s mansion – will they be able to save their friend in time?

Oh well, I guess I'll have to start all over

TUSK tanked at the U.S. box office. It played most theaters for a week, barely advertised, and skipped the second-run movie houses altogether in most cities. Many people when hearing of the premise, were quick to write it off as “HUMAN CENTIPEDE (2009), except this time the victim is turned into a walrus.” It's nowhere near that simple. The film's storyline takes on many complex shadings.

Big Gulps, now in blubber flavor

While frequently hilarious, TUSK makes the audience think twice before every chuckle. The ostensible hero, Long, is an unrepentant asshole. The most famous quote to emerge from the film is his plea “I don't want to die in Canada!” We've all laughed at YouTube videos where people are injured – “MAJOR FAIL!” – not thinking of the pain and injury suffered by the unlucky subjects. To paraphrase Mel Brooks, “Tragedy is you falling down a manhole: Comedy is me watching you fall down a manhole.” Director and writer Kevin Smith isn't letting the audience off the hook that easily, and all the laughs taken at the expense of others is literally taken out in flesh.

Remember kids, don't laugh, because you too could end up a human walrus!

Michael Parks performance as the mad surgeon is Oscar worthy. Perpetually kind and apologetic, his intentions are solely to create a friend for himself. His genteel manner doesn't crack once through the entire film, making for a profoundly unnerving character. There's more than just a little hint of homo-eroticism going on behind his eccentric proclivities, and the setup calls to mind the popular fetish as practiced by “furries” and “fursuiters.” Google those terms …

Parks as the Right Wing maniac preacher in Red State

Director Smith has dabbled in horror before. His RED STATE (2011) took a caustic look at small-minded provincialism as practiced in small town America. Smith digs into a dark chapter of Canadian modern history to explain some of Parks' motivations.  

If you like this then you'll love Mortdecai 

Johnny Depp is quite good as the detective, although it’s notable his performance is in the service of yet another box office flop with his name attached to it. Few people have forgiven Depp for THE LONE RANGER (2013) debacle of several seasons ago, and with the exception of Tim Burton's ALICE IN WONDERLAND (2010), Depp's recent films have underperformed at the box office: THE RUM DIARY (2011), DARK SHADOWS (2012), TRANSCENDENCE (2014) et cetera. 

TUSK, as hard as it is to believe, was based on an actual gag advertisement placed on Craig's List! The advertisement described a man looking for a roommate, with free room and board with the stipulation that the boarder spend two hours a day in costume and in character in a walrus suit. This story is related in the Blu-Ray and DVD extra entitled “Smodcast #259: The Walrus and the Carpenter.” Smith calls the phony advertisement as pure “Hammer Horror” and laughs uproariously throughout. This extra, presented with video-generated animation, unfortunately links Smith to his main character, who likewise found it perverse enough for widespread media coverage. Other extras on the Lionsgate disc are deleted scenes, “20 Years to Tusk” featurette, a brief making of documentary, and an audio commentary track with Smith.

Sung to the tune of "A Chorus Line", "One Singular sensational-Walrus"

TUSK is far better than many people's expectations. It has painfully funny comments to make on our anything-for-a-laugh media landscape, as well as some stately Gothic horror, truly in the manner of Terrence Fisher's “Hammer horrors.” As if it needs to be said, a certain Fleetwood Mac hit single comes wafting through in a climactic scene. See TUSK – you won't regret it.

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What The Peeper Saw

What the Peeper Saw (aka Diabólica malicia, Night Hair Child, 1971)

Directed by James Kelly and Andrew White (Andrea Bianchi)

 Review By Greg Goodsell 

Freshly wed to successful author Paul (Hardy Kruger), Elise (Britt Ekland, Asylum, 1972) touches down in Spain to stay at her new husband’s isolated villa. She is introduced to her stepson, 12-year-old Marcus (Mark Lester), a precocious lad sent home from boarding school due to a “chickenpox outbreak.” We find just how dysfunctional the situation is when Elise receives a call from Paul, she marches into the bathroom while the nude Marcus takes a bath, the boy takes the call, and then casually reaches around his stepmom in order to fondle her breasts! It only gets worse …

Yes, is this the rape crisis center I've heard about from Robocop?

Conferring with her stepson’s headmaster (Harry Andrews, I Want What I Want, 1972), Elise learns that there was no outbreak. Marcus was sent home for various infractions, such as cruelty to animals and spying on amorous couples. Marcus is the “peeper” of the title, and Elise, poking about in her new home, finds a hole in the attic floor that facilitates Marcus spying on Paul and her while they make love. Paul disavows his son’s psychopathology as hearsay, and the screw tightens. Elise plays a game of “Strip poker” with Marcus in order to find out about his mother’s death, and the boy admits to killing her.

I want a Ponnyy!

In the film’s only effective scene, psychologist Dr. Viorne (Lilli Palmer, The House That Screamed, 1969) confronts Elise with what the audience has been in on since the very start: She has been sexually abusing the boy, and it is she, and not the boy that is in dire need of an extended stay in a room with cushioned walls. Elise is eventually sprung from the madhouse. There is a brief reconciliation between her and Marcus, and an abrupt shock conclusion.  

I'm stocking up for my Hawg party!

What the Peeper Saw is a deservedly obscure horror thriller that never gets off to a steady boil. There is lots of blame to go around. The sunny Spanish hillsides generate little suspense -- although director Pete Walker was able to wring tension in Die Screaming Marianne using a similar, bright Portugal backdrop in 1971 – and the daring subject matter is shot down by some inept performances. While gorgeous, no one would ever mistake Ekland for a terrific actress. In spite of his intimidating presence, Kruger does little but march around and barks out his lines. Mark Lester just isn’t into his role as a “Bad Seed”-style tyke, a shame as arrogant, British schoolchildren always make for reliable movie villains.

What the Lifeguard Saw

(Poor Lester had gone from the title role of the crowd-pleasing musical Oliver! in 1968 to this negligible shocker in four short years. He left acting altogether to tend bar in the late Seventies, although he returns to the big screen in the yet-to-be released 1066 this very year.)   

Who let the dogs out? Twas The Peeper!

A major culprit in this most tepid enterprise is the film score of the usually reliable Stelvio Cipriani (Baron Blood, 1972, Femina Raiders, 1969 and Nightmare City, 1980- being my favorites -ed). Cipriani plows through all the scenes with a bland, mellow jazz score. An otherwise terrifying vision of Marcus seeing his dead mother emerging from the family’s swimming pool is undercut by a light instrumental that is also reprised in the film’s shock ending.

Can you toss in some Epsom salts?

VCI has released What the Peeper Saw to Blu-Ray, but viewers won’t be able to tell the difference between the current presentation and a battered video rental. The visuals are grainy and under-lit, and the soundtrack is similarly muffled and murky.

The disc has 12 chapter stops and includes both the film’s theatrical trailer and a 30-second radio spot. Essentially yet another “killer kid” movie, What the Peeper Saw really isn’t worth seeing. 

BUY HERE ON Blu-ray!

THUNDER OF GIGANTIC SERPENT (1988)

Directed by Godfrey Ho, Starring Pierre Kirby (1988 Footage from King Snake 1983).

Movie Review by Greg Goodsell

This Thai-Hong Kong coproduction, as the hippies of yesteryear would proclaim, “is somethin’ else!” From its elegantly phrased English title, Thunder of Gigantic Serpent is one part berserk kiddie film that borrows heavily from Steven Spielberg’s ET: The Extra Terrestrial, one part macho action adventure film unafraid to let the “f-bomb” fly at every opportunity and one part kaiju-eiga. With the American re-imagining of Godzilla raking in dough at the box office, it’s as good as time as any to revisit it. I first caught this feature on an overseas VHS cassette with Greek subtitles, which dovetails into a sad little story of its own … but I digress.

James Bond-like villain Solomon has his eye on a secret research lab. Said mountain laboratory is being used by scientists working on a tip-top confidential plan to feed the world’s hungry by making all living organisms larger. Putting a frog in a glass terrarium – the boffins fling a switch and voila – frog becomes a giant amphibian! Ribbit! Before the researchers have a chance to put their discovery to practical use, the bad guys besiege the lab in a machine gun attack. As the white coaters run into the countryside to escape the hail of bullets, one of the scientists takes the new-fangled terrarium and hurls it from her speeding car.

Evil Caucasian Solomon.

Cut to the suburban home of lonely little girl Ting who befriends a friendly garden snake she calls Mozlar. In the manner of films of this type, Ting Ting is dubbed by an adult actress who screams her way through all her lines. “Mozlar! Mozlar! MOZLAR! (Giggling) Oh, you silly snake!” “Mozlar, Mozlar, MOZLAR, NO! Don’t eat the nice lady!” Repeat those lines ad infinitum at glass-shattering levels, and you get the idea.

The Kukla, Fran and Ting Ting show at ear-splitting volume

Keeping Mozlar a closely guarded secret from her prying parents, Ting Ting finds the abandoned terrarium by the side of the road and takes it home for a suitable case for her pet snake. A switch is thrown and – BANG WALLOP, Mozlar is now an outsized, absurd hand puppet. Even harder to hide, Ting Ting has lots of hilarious misadventures in keeping her snake away from the prying eyes of her parents.

Mozlar likes to suck eggs!

In the meantime, Solomon and his band of no-goodniks are searching for the growth terrarium. Finally tracking the terrarium back to Ting, the bad guys accidentally electrify Mozlar – who now grows to Godzilla-like proportions. Rampaging through the city, in a series of special effects scenes that are just as good or better as anything Japan was cranking out with its giant monsters, lots of people panic and run around in stairwells, the bad guys are thwarted – and Ting loses a friend. Mozlar was a GOOD snake, and didn’t mean to kill all those thousands of people and lay waste to the city, Ting says.

Good snake my ass!

PHEW! Thunder of Gigantic Serpent is a manic monster movie experience that sweeps up the viewer in its confused, juvenile story. A catchy techno score will leave you tapping your toes while you shake your head at the utter dang awfulness of it all. You won’t be bored. Director Godfrey Ho was well known for his cut-and-paste features, and lots of the scenes here don’t come together. An overly sickly sweet child’s fantasy is wedded to scenes of mass slaughter and martial arts, Thunder of Gigantic Serpent is, if nothing else, unique and highly entertaining.

Take that, you lackey of the scientific establishment!

As for my story regarding the Greek VHS – sometime in the late nineties, I was intrigued by the tape, offered for sale on Internet auction site eBay. I knew full well that I wouldn’t be able to watch it on my own equipment, and so I gave a shout-out to a so-called friend who converted overseas VHS tapes for his gray market business. I offered to give him the tape to convert, but he was adamant that I would have to pay his usual fee. He wasn’t interested in offering the film as he dealt exclusively with European trash cinema – OOOOOPS! Did I just give his identity away? Too late now!

That's some putrid hummus Mr. Ledbetter

Well, I paid my fees, got the compatible VHS copy of the film – and the guy turns around immediately and offers it in his catalog!!!!! Thanks a lot! What can I say? There is no honor among thieves, as they say. In fact, I think the rip of offed on YouTube here is from my tape! In either case, Thunder of Gigantic Serpent makes for great six pack and chips amusement. Have a nice one, Craig!     

NO LINK!

A car wreck always adds production values.

Hmmmmm ... a giant snake.

The magic terrarium that figures later in the plot. PAY ATTENTION.

Glow little glow worm glow!

Did you wash your hands?

Why all the FUTZ (1969)? NOT the worst of its type

FUTZ! Directed By Tom O' Horgan (1969).
Review By Greg Goodsell

Interested in a story involving incest, bestiality and murder in a rural rustic community? Performed by a cast of hippie hillbillies that screams, sings, shouts and flail about as if in an epileptic seizure? If so, you are directed to see Futz (1969), a notorious counter-cultural bit of flotsam that serves as an argument that what may play well in a 99-set equity waiver theater may not translate that well to the screen.

Futz first dropped on my radar when Neal Gabler on PBS’ “Sneak Previews” (1982; both he and Jeffrey Lyons replaced original critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert) declared it as the worst film he had ever seen. Unable to find film clips, Gabler showed black-and-white photos of the cast’s spastic farmers as proof that this bizarre feature, about a sustenance farmer’s love affair with his pig, existed. (On the same show, Lyons had announced the Charles Manson-inspired schlocker Sweet Savior (1971) starring faded teen idol Troy Donahue, as his personal worst.)

Carrot Top -- the homeless years.

Based on an avant-garde play by Rochelle Owens, Futz was adapted to the screen by none other than Joseph Stefano, the man who adapted Robert Bloch’s Psycho for director Alfred Hitchcock in 1960! Futz likewise deals with psychosexual issues in a far less successful way.

By the light of the silvery moon -- incest!

The “story” if it can be called that: Our hero, Cyrus Futz (John Bakos) has foresworn off all normal human relations to the consternation of his erstwhile girlfriend Majorie Satz (Beth Porter). Futz has sworn all his romantic allegiance to his pig, which is hopefully platonic. No, Futz doesn’t plumb the depths of The Wedding Trough, aka The Pig Fucking Movie (aka Vase de noces, 1975) – wait for it. Meanwhile in the village, Oscar Loop (Seth Allen), the village idiot has brutally murdered a girl, saying that what he saw in Futz’ barn drove him to it. Oscar is executed, and Futz is tried as an accessory to murder.

Audience reaction to FUTZ!

This thumbnail sketch can’t begin to convey the texture of Futz. People scream, fly across the screen, strike poses and speak incomprehensible dialogue. It pretty much wears out its welcome within the first 10 minutes, and navigating through the film’s 91 minutes is quite a chore. Beginning with a highbrow orchestral recital that descends into chaos, Futz gibbers and screams across the screen. 

Have we ever seen a flutist flouting it as heavily as we do here?

Behind the camera is world-class photographer Vilmos Zsigmond, who was still cutting his teeth on negligible grindhouse fare such as Al Adamason’s Satan’s Sadists (1969) and Horror of the Blood Monsters (1970) at this point. His photography is by far the film’s best fea-ture, with beautiful compositions of the stark country-side. Futz has solid production values, with great photography, high-strung performances and an important mes-sage. At heart, the story of Futz is one on the importance of personal liberties, and how a community can work to ostracize those who are different. It’s all buried underneath attempts at being unconventional. As such, Futz remains a highly dated vision of hippie utopia as filtered through an old Bethel Buckalew hicks-ploitation film.  

This is the film in essence. Ugly hippie art.

Believe it or not, as lame as it is, Futz is NOT the worst film of its particular type. This reviewer argues that Strong Medicine (1981), also based on an avant-garde play by director Richard Foreman is THE WORST film of this particular type. Calling to mind a mixture of Samuel Beckett and Edward D. Wood Jr. with dialogue recorded verbatim from the dementia ward of a retirement community, Strong Medicine’s “story” is open for debate.

O.K. everyone get up on stage, and present their ideas on how to get out of this movie.

Strong Medicine’s heroine, Kate Manheim attempts to take a vacation but is met with opposition by characters dressed in 1930’s attire. Everyone wears thick eye makeup, men included. Sentences spoken by the performers change in midstream and usually end with the actors flailing about on the floor. At one point, Manheim dresses up as a chicken to everyone’s disinterest, and then stabs herself to death to satisfy the unspoken wish fulfillment for the audience. Buck Henry has a one-line spoken cameo and actors Raul Julia and Carol Kane are also reportedly somewhere in the debris as well. 

Quick! Before the church buffet is picked clean!

Anyone interested in seeing films that are different, very, very different – but not good, should put both Futz and Strong Medicine in their movie-watching queue. You can see Futz for absolutely free on YouTube by going here!
 
 

                                    STRONG MEDICINE: Chicken woman. Cluck cluck cluck.

Push the button, Frank!

Oh, you Futz! He majored in animal husbandry until they caught him at it.