Biohazard

If you're watching this movie, you're either a Fred Olen Ray fan, you found it on the $4.99 shelf at Suncoast and thought "what do I have to lose?", or you spun around the video store with your eyes closed and rented the first movie your finger touched.

This movie is hysterically bad. It's got everything a terrible movie needs: a screenplay featuring jaw-dropping dialogue and baffling detours in the plot, wacky science involving psychics and other dimensions, continuity that seems to travel through wormholes in time and space, actors that are not only wooden, but seems to border on befuddled, gratuitous nudity (not all of it is what you necessarily would ask for), and of course, a 5' monster played by what I assume is Fred Olen Ray's kid.

Underneath it all, however, there is something resembling heart -- as if Mickey & Judy decided to get together all the kids in the neighborhood and make a monster movie (hey! my dad can direct it! yeah! We can use red paint from my johnny's dad's hardware store, and I know this ex-stripper who can act in it!).

Watch for the blooper reel over the credits -- you get to find out why the final cut of the movie was so crappy.

Incidentally, Biohazard II...the Alien Force is also worth a look, but doesn't have the same enjoyably crappy veneer this one does.

Some Typical Scientists are up to ridiculous things in "Biohazard". Working in isolation in rural America, they're experimenting in transferring matter from other dimensions. One object that they successfully transfer is a container; said container just so happens to have a creature inside it. Naturally, the creature gets loose, and slaughters various unlucky dummies. Supposedly the creature only does this out of fear, but who knows? The hero on the case is the intrepid Mitchell Carter (William Fair), who hooks up with Lisa Martyn (sexy Angelique Pettyjohn), a psychic working on the project.

This offering from the prolific B movie veteran Fred Olen Ray was two years in the making, as hard as that may be to believe. It looks like it could have been cobbled together in a matter of days. It's *that* cheap and *that* inept. Still, like so many other movies of this variety, it entertains in its own stumbling way. A lot of the elements required for such a lark are present and accounted for: laughable acting across the board (star attraction Aldo Ray, who's actually barely in the thing, is visibly drunk), a serving of bare breasts, an utterly horrid rubber creature suit (worn by the directors' son Christopher, who was just five years old at the time), wonderfully tacky gore as the monster mutilates its victims, a delicious synth score, a respectable amount of cheese, etc. That's Carroll Borland from Tod Brownings' 1935 film "Mark of the Vampire" as local woman Rula Murphy.

The ending is sudden, VERY silly, and unsatisfying, and it does lead one to believe that the production just ran out of time and money. After that, we get a very protracted end credits sequence that's padded out with plentiful outtake footage - which isn't all that funny.

If you adore bad movies, you might like this one, but fair warning: there's often more talk than action, and sometimes it's kind of dull. It does have one hilariously stupid moment involving an "E.T." poster.

Ray and assistant director Donald G. Jackson play the medics.

Five out of 10.

I saw this at the video store, and after passing it a few definite times, the oversized box and cheesy cover art finally got to me, and I knew I just had to rent this. I don't really know what compelled me, but I really do regret it.

I couldn't follow the plot, but here's the gist of it: Scientists use psychic Lisa (Angelique Pettyjohn) to do something that will entail contacting an alien or something stupid like that. All I know is that eventually, a transported case with some alien bursts open, and ET--after a kill or two--breaks free and runs around the middle of nowhere killing people. For some reason, Lisa and one of the scientists (who is also a love interest) are needed to help find this thing, as it kills randomly for the rest of the movie. Then again, there could be more, but I watched through fast-forward for the last twenty minutes, and was only interested by the "shock" ending.

The one thing that surprised me the most was the fact that this movie was only ONE HOUR long! I mean, with a running time like that, you would think it would be nonstop fun. Umm...no. It's dull as hell, with Ray's son in a rubber costume running around killing hobos, old people, young couples, etc, from time to time, and Lisa and Mr. Scientist Love Interest chasing it down with other stock characters. *sighs* I can't believe how bad this was.

The blooper reel during the closing credits was mildly entertaining, and filled another ten minutes into the movie, making it a whopping 70 minutes, but that didn't even save this bomb. I really can't say I recommend this the least bit. (And anyway, I had no idea what was going on, becuase I fast-forwarded so much. You may do the same, if you dare watch this.)

This one has some terrible dialogue and sub par special effects. It also has an alcoholic Aldo Ray as some kind of government employee. Angelique Pettyjohn shows off her "assets" in a few scenes but her wig is obvious and nearly falls off! The alien monster is the director's son. The plot revolves around Angelique's ability to channel psychic vibes and transfer creatures (and a tiny little statue!?!) from outer space to the Earth. Of course this is done with the help of a scientist and his laboratory deep in the southwest, probably where many westerns of the 50s and 60s were filmed. A lot of the scenes are shot at night. There's also a little gore and some creature makeup. Good late night viewing! Especially if you put your brain on idle for a while. 3 out of 10 .

I couldn't believe some of the horrible dialog coming out of people's mouths, and the end reel of bloopers attached to body of the film was a real hoot. And we get titty shots of Angelique Pettyjohn (sort of) and Loren Crabtree to boot.

A teleportation device activated by psychic Angelique Pettyjohn brings an alien container to an underground lab out in the desert. According to director Fred Olen Ray, they were leftover sets from the Klaus Kinski film, ANDROID which gives the film an increased value beyond how cheap it looks.

Inside the container is a midget alien (played by Ray's son) who starts clawing people to death. It was pretty funny watching this little 'creature' in a black reptile suit with what looks like large beetle shells attached to it, running around in the dark. We even get to see the little thing stamp and tear at a poster of ET, which I thought was hilarious.

And then there's what looks like a snake that also comes out of the container that gets hammered to death by William Fair, after the mini creature chews into Frank McDonald's neck in the kitchen. A low budget take on ALIEN, I suppose...

The whole thing ends abruptly, looking like they ran out of film at the end before the blooper reel comes in with the end credits. Talk about a lack of funding...

Fred Olen Ray also mentions in the director's commentary that they also weren't sure if Aldo Ray would make through the shooting and remember his lines. He barely did.

Low budget cheese sneeze. It's fun to watch, I'll grant ya that.

4 out of 10