Fatal Pulse – 1988, US, 87m. Director: Anthony J. Christopher. Streaming: YouTube
Hell High – 1987, US, 84m. Director: Douglas Grossman. Streaming: Arrow
The Initiation – 1984, US, 97m. Director: Larry Stewart, Peter Crane. Streaming: Arrow, Tubi
Return to Horror High – 1987, US, 95m. Director: Bill Froehlich. Streaming: Tubi
FATAL PULSE (1988) When a sorority babe from AOK House (no, seriously) is strangled with her own lingerie by a psycho in black gloves, all the students finger the victim’s dimwitted boyfriend, Jeff (Ken Roberts). Jeff is too busy trying to rekindle a relationship with his ex to notice police swarming the sorority house and is told by his friend (Steven Henry) of the murder. Fellow AOK housemate, Cassie (Cindra Skotzko), mourns for her fallen sister while her friends ignore the murder and go on with their jazzercising and partying. But it’s too late, as a second sorority student has her throat slashed. Jeff tries to be the hero and sets up a trap for Ernie (Joe Estevez, Martin Sheen’s bro), the house handyman and obvious red herring. The plan fails and Jeff once again becomes the prime suspect. Why nobody seems suspicious about moody Prof. Cauldwell (Alex Courtney), who practically has “mad slasher” stamped on his forehead, is a testament to the writer’s lack of understanding the basic principles of suspenseful storytelling. Two more sorority sisters are butchered before the predictable ending reveals the killer’s identity and the incurable disease that triggered the massacre. The title is ironic as Fatal Pulse is about as lifeless as a slasher movie can get—the viewer can’t even rely on the subgenre’s tried-and-true splatter for a little excitement. The only thing audiences can expect from Fatal Pulse is a quick way to fall asleep. D–
HELL HIGH (1987) (AKA: Real Trouble) A high-strung little girl playing with dolls in some backwoods swamp spies on a couple of teens inside a makeshift passion pit. When the woman rejects the man’s advances he breaks one of the little girl’s dolls in frustration. In retaliation, the kid tosses a bucket of mud at the man while he’s driving away and crashes his motorcycle, impaling him and his girlfriend on a bed of spikes. Eighteen years later, that girl is now high-strung high school teacher, Miss Storm (Maureen Mooney), who after berating one of her students in front of the class becomes a target for a group of troublemakers. The teens pull a Carrie-like prank on Miss Storm, but instead of pig’s blood they douse her in mud—the sight of which sends Miss Storm into a frenzy until she completely snaps and enacts bloody revenge. It might feature typical slasher movie tropes, but Hell High feels more like a demented version of a John Hughes film—I Spit on Your Breakfast Club? The characters are more fleshed out than you’d find in a splatter flick, and the actors are good and feel like actual high schoolers. The film gets points for going to dark places most teen body count movies don’t—especially in the eighties—and builds to a bleak but genuine ending. One of Joe Bob Brigg’s favorites; worthy of discovery. B
THE INITIATION(1984) Sorority pledge Kelly Fairchild (Daphne Zuniga) suffers from a recurring nightmare in which—after she sees her parents having sex as a child—she stabs her father before he’s attacked by a strange man. Do I sense a little Freudism here? Kelly also agonizes from a form of amnesia, which coincidentally began around the age Kelly is in her nightmare. Her overprotective mother (Vera Miles) tells Kelly her illness is the result of a fall from a tree when she was nine. But it doesn’t take Freud to sense a disturbing family secret lingering in the screenplay. Does it have anything to do with the escaped killer from the local sanitarium who’s targeted Kelly and her pledge sisters? The Initiation is a well-produced slasher that’s saddled with a needless amount of melodrama—it doesn’t come to a surprise to learn the film was written by Charlies Pratt, Jr, who at the time was a staff writer on General Hospital. The movie’s “soap opera” tactics often overshadow the production, giving the film a ludicrously overblown feel that doesn’t gel with the rest of the story. But once The Initiation settles into its basic stalk-n-slash plot it delivers plenty of sanguinary action, including the decapitation of genre favorite, Clu Gulager. B–
RETURN TO HORROR HIGH(1987) The flaky production crew of a cheap horror movie (life imitating art?) making a film about the “real-life” exploits of the Crippen High slasher run into more than just financial woes when the escaped killer returns to the scene of the crime. Setting up shop in the abandoned school’s gymnasium, the crew is bossed around by their sleazoid producer (Alex Rocco) while the actors make life hell for their young director (Scott Jacoby), including the movie’s lead who quits after landing a role on a television series—this is ironic since the actor is played by George Clooney. Bodies start dropping (or, in some cases, bouncing) as the masked maniac whittles down the cast and crew. This is intermixed with flashbacks of the original murders, which are woven into the film-within-the-film’s “making-of” structure. Return to Horror High is first and foremost a parody of eighties slasher flicks, which ends up being its downfall since the movie is never very funny. Ultimately, it’s really just a mediocre slasher that never lives up to its own inspirations. The Brady Bunch‘s Maureen McCormick gets a few laughs as a police officer turned on by blood. C
The Dorm That Dripped Blood – 1982, US, 88m. Director: Stephen Carpenter, Jeffrey Obrow. Streaming: N/A
The House on Sorority Row – 1982, US, 91m. Director: Mark Rosman. Streaming: AMC/Prime, Shudder, Tubi
Sorority House Massacre – 1986, US, 74m. Director: Carol Frank. Streaming: Tubi
Splatter University – 1984, US, 78m. Director: Richard W. Haines. Streaming: N/A
THE DORM THAT DRIPPED BLOOD(1982) (AKA: Death Dorm, Pranks) Several members of a student co-op stay behind during the Christmas break to ready the building for demolition. A hooded killer sees this as the perfect opportunity to bump off the teens, one by one, in particularly brutal fashion. An unsuspecting passerby gets his brains bashed in with a nail-embedded baseball bat, while another has a hole put into the back of his skull with a power drill. The prime suspect is a mysterious transient who’s been seen roaming the campus, but any savvy viewer will spot the slasher movie “red herring” motif. Friday the 13th was the obvious inspiration for this low-budget splatter flick, as its characters, isolated setting, and Savini-like gore FX are all very reminiscent of that classic, which isn’t a bad thing. The teens are likable enough, the pacing is adequate, and the murders are juicy. In the end, the movie can’t distinguish itself from the rest of the campus-themed slashers of the time, but if you like your feathered-haired student body extra-bloodied, you’ll enjoy The Dorm That Dripped Blood. Originally released in the UK as Pranks, where it was selected as one of the notorious “video nasties”—a sign of quality for many a gorehound. B–
THE HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW (1982) A group of sorority pals are denied a graduation party by mean old house mother, Mrs. Slater (Lois Kelso Hunt). That’s because the party is planned for June 19—a date revealed to the viewer, via prologue, as that of Mrs. Slater’s 1961 delivery of a stillborn baby. In retaliation, the sorority women pull a prank which results in Mrs. Slater’s accidental death. They quickly dispose of the body and continue on with their party. The bad news is that someone creeping around the sorority attic was witness to the crime and subsequently commits a series of revenge killings. Could all of this slaughter have something to do with the supposedly dead child from twenty years earlier? A textbook example of an early eighties slasher, highlighted by colorful characters, energetic actors, and a Pino Donaggio-esque score by Charles Band. A slick production that for most of its runtime engages the viewer—until its tried-and-true cat-and-mouse finale, pitting virginal Final Girl Kate McNeil against the slasher, here decked out in a creepy clown costume. A somewhat lackluster conclusion kills some of the buzz, but not much. B
SORORITY HOUSE MASSACRE(1986) The death of Beth’s aunt triggers a series of strange dreams and hallucinations—visions that include the figure of a man with a knife. Meanwhile, over at the local mental asylum, a patient named Bobby (John C. Russell) becomes violently agitated, escapes, and, knife in hand, heads to the UCLA sorority house where Beth (Angela O’Neill) and her classmates are staying over spring break. The plot parallels Halloween in more ways than one, but Sorority House Massacre deserves more credit than being labeled just another rip-off. The writers obviously put time and care into the structure of the screenplay and have created a thoughtful story that’s more concerned with intelligent, sympathetic characters than with mindless splatter. That said, the movie does have its share of gory kills, which are skillfully intermixed with moments of actual suspense. Only one of those silly it’s-only-a-dream surprise endings stains an otherwise good little movie. B
SPLATTER UNIVERSITY (1984) A schizophrenic psychopath named Grayham is locked up in the city mental hospital. After knifing his doctor in the crotch and slitting his throat, Grayham steals the doc’s clothes and escapes. Three years later, a young teacher at St. Trinian’s College is fatally stabbed by an unseen assailant. Grad student Julie (Francine Forbes) takes over the position, but it’s not her class subject—Marx’s Aspects of Alienation—that makes the student body gradually dwindle. It’s the killer, who strikes again and again. Julie’s new beau (and fellow teacher) becomes Prime Suspect No. 1—especially after Julie and her friend do a little Scooby-Doo snooping and discover newspaper clippings of the recent slashings in his house. But viewers will most likely be eyeing the obvious culprit: the wheelchair-bound dean (Dick Biel) who’s actually—surprise, surprise!—Grayham. Although released in 1984, Splatter University was obviously filmed years earlier (maybe the week after Friday the 13th opened). The make-up effects are chintzy but convincing—a bathroom stall disemboweling is quite gruesome—and the script lacks the slightest shred of mystery and suspense. If you like your slashers fast, cheap, and bloody, believe me—you can do a lot worse. C+
Damned River – 1989, US, 95m. Director: Michael Schroeder. Streaming: Prime
One Dark Night – 1982, US, 89m. Director: Tom McLoughlin. Streaming: Freevee, Tubi
CHOPPING MALL(1986) (AKA: Kill Bots) A prestigious indoor shopping mall is retrofitted with three technologically advanced security robots designed to “neutralize” criminals in the act of thievery. Unfortunately for a group of teen employees using the mall for some after hours partying, the bots are turned into kill machines when the mainframe short circuits from a lightening strike. The robots go around neutralizing the teens to death, a favorite method being laser beams which shoot out of the bots’ eyes, vaporizing anything in their path, including human heads. All of this is done tongue-in-cheek with a satirical play on consumerism and the false security of A.I.—Chopping Mall‘s themes, and an in-movie infomercial, predates RoboCop by a year, lending the film a bit more credibility. The characters are disposable airheads (the exception is Kelli Maroney’s brainy Final Girl), but the special FX set pieces are fairly impressive given the movie’s somewhat chintzy vibe. A brisk pace and knowledge of pop culture—in reference to the iconic filmmaker, the mall’s gun store is called Peckinpah’s—helps Chopping Mall grow into a decent little flick. B
DAMNED RIVER(1989) Stephen Shellen, who so gleefully danced in his skivvies in the teen sex romp Gimme an F, here seems out of his element as a psychopathic killer. Shellen is Ray, an expat working as a guide in Africa and hired by four stereotypically dumb American twenty-somethings—we know one of them is “intelligent” because he keeps quoting Byron—to aid them down some whitewater rapids. The seemingly normal Ray starts to show his true colors when his loudmouth clients begin to wear down his polite exterior. With an AK-47 in hand, Ray whittles down the threats, which is anyone who stands between him and his twisted views on freedom, justice, and the demented wildman way of life, which includes rape and decapitation. There are a few intense moments delivered in between Shellen screaming his lines and waving a gun in the air, but in the end it’s difficult to muster much emotion for characters who’re massively unsympathetic. Shellen’s performance is uneven and damages a lot of potential impact, something Kevin Bacon handled much better in the similarly themed The River Wild. In keeping up with the awfulness of the writing, after smacking Ray in the face with an oar and watching his body carried off by the river, a character mutters, “Now we’re just like you.” Damned drivel. D
ONE DARK NIGHT(1982) The dead bodies of six young women are found in the apartment of a Russian occult practitioner called Raymar. Known as a “psychic vampire,” Raymar is himself also found deceased, his body eventually entombed in a grand mausoleum. But the parapsychic killer isn’t exactly dead, a fact sorority pledge hopeful Julie (Meg Tilly) comes to realize after she accepts the challenge of spending the night alone inside the mausoleum. Raymar awakens and lets loose his telekinetic powers, which brings several of his dead neighbors back from the underworld. A large imagination and splashes of inventive special make-up FX help to lift One Dark Night above its sometimes slack pacing. The film also benefits from well-rounded characters and a sympathetic turn from eventual Oscar-nominee Tilly in one of her earliest roles. Good direction from future Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives helmer, Tom McLoughlin. B
DARK SANITY (1982) (AKA: Straight Jacket) One-time Hollywood golden boy Aldo Ray slums it in this goes-nowhere “thriller.” Married couple Al and Karen move into a new house in Southern California, where Karen (Kory Clark) immediately senses danger. Al (Chuck Jamison) dismisses his wife’s jitters and reminds her of her unsavory past as an alcoholic—this hilariously overwrought moment of melodrama is followed by Al stepping out for a beer. Whatta husband! Soon after, Karen begins having vivid premonitions of a decapitation murder in the house. Being the jerk he is, Al berates Karen about her visions and believes she’s back on the sauce. Karen (who’s not exactly the warmest character) later bumps into an ex-cop (Ray) who years earlier had similar visions while investigating a decapitation killing in the same house—the head of that victim was never found. There’s also a dimwitted gardener running around with an extra large pair of shears. In the end, Karen ends up being about as sympathetic as the sofa you stub your toe on in the middle of the night. The premonition subplot never amounts to anything except a cheap form of exposition, the drama having about as much of an impact as a kindergarten production of Lucy Goosey. The acting is on the same level as an Ed Wood flick; Ray stumbles over his lines—and the musical score sounds like it was taken from a 1950s western. For the bad movie connoisseur, Dark Sanity is a must-see. For everybody else it’s a must-not. D, or B, depending on your preference.
DISCONNECTED(1984) Connecticut’s own one-man show, Gorman Bechard, wrote, directed, edited, and shot this interesting slasher as his first feature—and while the results aren’t anything to write home about, the film is a showcase for Bechard as a talented independent filmmaker. Video store owner Alicia (Frances Sherman) starts receiving disturbing phone calls. At first she brushes them off as the work of a heavy-breather, but Alicia’s sanity soon begins to slip when she has vivid nightmares of her bitchy twin sister (also Sherman) and ex-boyfriend trying to kill her. Fortunately for Alicia, the handsome Franklin (Mark Walker) helps take her mind off the recent troubles—unfortunately, Franklin is a psychopathic necrophiliac responsible for a string of murders in the area. In the end, Alicia escapes death but becomes disconnected from the world, slowly descending into Catherine Deneuve territory, á la Repulsion. The viewer also can’t help feel disconnected from the story and the uneven structure of blurred reality vs. splatter flick. Sherman is likable, and at least two-thirds of Disconnected are engaging, but it’s not enough to recommend to non-Gorman fans. A warm-up to Bechard’s video semi-classic, Psychos in Love. C+
THE LAST HOUSE ON DEAD END STREET (1973) (AKA: The Fun House) Greasy ex-con Terry (director Roger Watkins) becomes disillusioned with society and forms a group of equally scuzzy losers to make cheap porn movies aimed at the bourgeoisie. The problem is sex is no longer a selling point, leading Terry and his merry band of Susan Atkins-like followers to commit atrocious acts of violence and murder on film. An ugly, nihilistic movie that’s not the brainless gore job you’d think, but a semi-intelligent view of humanity at its worst. According to Watkins, Last House on Dead End Street was partially inspired by the Manson family and Watkins’s overall bafflement with the political and economical situations of the time. Brutal and unpleasant, but not without its merits. Recommended only for the adventurous viewer. Unreleased commercially until 1977. B–
THE SLAYER (1982) Moody artist Kay (Sarah Kendall) is having nightmares—not just random nightmares, but ones featuring a snarling beast with sharp claws. Kay’s husband (who’s a complete dolt) and her friends help her forget her woes by spiriting Kay off to an isolated island for a week of relaxation. Once they arrive, the always-miserable Kay immediately begins pouting, while her husband (Alan McRae) ignores her scowling, and Kay’s best friend (Carol Kottenbrook) complains. Kay later believes a nearby rundown theater house is the same building she’s been painting back home. Her ever-supportive husband dismisses her, but the wiser viewer will know this is some heavy-duty foreshadowing. Kay continues to mope and have more nightmares, while a local fisherman’s brains are bashed in by a mystery killer. The killer then sets their eyes on Kay and her friends, who are whittled down (not quickly enough) with an assortment of sharp objects. Could the slasher be Kay’s dream demon? It doesn’t take a Rhodes scholar to figure it out—which raises the question of why the filmmakers decided to try creating a mystery in the transparent screenplay. The characters are too obtuse to care about, the pacing slow, and the gore effects cheap and unconvincing. There’s an elaborate impalement by pitchfork, but by that point in the film you’ll be far from impressed. Director J.S. Cardone would go on to helm the much more entertaining Shadowzone. C–
SAW XHalloween III. Friday the 13th Part 5. Spiral. What those three sequels have in common is the absence of their franchise’s key players: the killers fans have come to love watching butcher innocent victims. Halloween had Michael Myers; Friday the 13th had Jason; Saw had Jigsaw, but when you take them away it can render the film—no matter how enjoyable it may be—moot. As well-intended as the Jigsaw-less Spiral was, there was obviously something…missing. Despite Jigsaw’s (AKA John Kramer) removal from the series after his demise in Saw III, the later sequels managed to work around that void by maintaining the tone of the earlier movies—and subsequent flashbacks occasionally brought Kramer back into action. With Saw X, the filmmakers solved the problem of a deceased lead character by going back to the beginning (circa 2005) and offering a story of what serial killer John Kramer (Tobin Bell) was doing in between the events of Saw and Saw II. And the results are cheerfully gruesome. Returning to the series after performing directorial double-duty for Saw VI (one of the better in the series) and Saw 3-D (not one of the better), Kevin Greutert and the writers pump Saw X with enough energy and character development to please both hardcore fans and newcomers, including one of the nastiest kills in the entire Saw franchise. While the story is set far back in the Saw timeline, Saw X is a thoroughly satisfying way to cap the John Kramer saga. At least until they make another one. Yikes. B+
EVIL DEAD RISEAnother Evil Dead reboot to emerge after the 2013 remake failed to reignite the franchise, this appropriately gnarly reimagining of the original 1981 horror classic moves the action to Los Angeles, where the teens of a single-parent family discover the dreaded Book of the Dead in a hidden vault under their apartment complex. It isn’t long until Deadites are possessing the inhabits of the building and turning the place into a blood-covered hellhole, à la Demons 2. The first movie in the series to abandon the cabin-in-the-woods scenario since Army of Darkness, Evil Dead Rise works surprisingly well, especially in the third act when things go completely batshit crazy—but it wouldn’t be an Evil Dead movie any other way. You won’t feel a thing for the lifeless characters—who spend most of the film looking as if their Deadite Mommy just returned home with a bad haircut—but this is a fun and cheerfully gruesome return to form for the long-running series. Burning question: Why is there an industrial-size woodchipper in the basement of an L.A. apartment building? B
V/H/S/85 The popular low-fi found footage anthology series pumps out its sixth, and most ambitious, installment with an 80’s aesthetic. As with the majority of the V/H/S films, the five tales in V/H/S/85 are intertwined with a wraparound story, which here features a small group of scientists experimenting on an otherworldly being nicknamed “Rory” in a university lab. The kicker is that Rory has the ability to mimic anyone, or anything, it comes into contact with. This story, called “Total Copy,” grows increasingly weird and eerie, eventually building to a gruesome and comical conclusion. In between “Total Copy” segments we get the typical mix of good—and not so good—entries. The first, “No Wake,” opens the movie with a bang and later reveals a twist that you won’t see coming. And while the earthquake-opening-the-pits-of-another-dimension, Mexico City-set “God of Death” underwhelms with its chintzy FX and flat climax, the final story (“Dreamkill”) shines bright, as a homicide detective races against the clock to uncover the truth behind a series of dream-related murders. Directed by The Black Phone‘s Scott Derrickson, “Dreamkill” is pure energy. It might not be the best the franchise has to offer (my money is on V/H/S/2), but V/H/S/85 is worthy of rewinding. B
THE POPE’S EXORCISTTaking a stab at the “based on real case files” scenario The Conjuring made popular ten years earlier, The Pope’s Exorcist delivers a “true” chapter out of Father Gabriel Amorth’s (Russell Crowe) book of paranormal activity. The only official head exorcist to the Vatican, Father Amorth tries to help a small American family whose young son (Peter DeSouza-Feighoney) becomes possessed by a demonic force after they relocate to an inherited piece of property in Spain, 1987. Upon investigation of the site—a decaying abbey—Amorth, along with a local priest (Daniel Zovatto), discovers the place harbors an evil secret that connects back to the Catholic Church. While the possession plot takes center stage, the film feels more like an epic haunted house movie, complete with dark corridors, mysterious knockings at night, and a grandiose finale taking place in a corpse-laden cellar. It’s familiar territory, but director Julius Avery (Overlord) infuses the movie with energy, humor, and a lightening-quick pace. Crowe has obvious fun in a role that practically begs for its own Netflix series. B
THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER In order to contact a deceased relative, two junior high friends perform a backwoods seance. Three days later, the girls are found at a farm miles away from their homes with no memory of what happened or how they arrived at the strange location. After returning to their families, the kids begin speaking in grainy voices and manifesting hideous scars on their faces. Puberty it ain’t, as the pair (Lidya Jewett and Olivia O’Neill) enter Linda Blairsville and become the victims of demonic possession. In a desperate attempt to help his daughter, single father Victor (Leslie Odom Jr.) reaches out to Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn), who wrote a Deepak Chopra-esque self-healing guide for those suffering from demonic possession—an act that made Regan flee into hiding. Like the majority of recent decades-later sequels, The Exorcist: Believer was bound to disappoint. Granted, the film’s thin screenplay never grabs the viewer and pulls them in as the 1973 original did (and to lesser extend, the under-appreciated The Exorcist III). However, Believer present a modest tale of domestic horror that works for the most part. The good cast adds flavor to an often aimless plot, especially young Jewett and O’Neill, both of whom deliver exceptionally creepy performances. It might not be the best Exorcist sequel out there, but Believer is most certainly not the worst. B–
HELL HOUSE LLC ORIGINS: THE CARMICHAEL MANOR Stop me if you’ve heard this one… Friends investigating a dark part of unexplained history go missing, and all that remains is the footage they filmed in the days leading up to their disappearance. This is the beginning sentence of every other found footage horror story since The Blair Witch Project exploded onto the scene twenty-four years earlier—or forty-three years, if you wanna get technical, with Cannibal Holocaust. The reason this theme is ever so popular among POV horror filmmakers is because it’s a helluva pitch, igniting within the viewer’s brain all manner of imagined terrors that might unfold as they sit down to watch. When done correctly, the simple premise can turn into a truly scary experience. This was the case with 2015’s Hell House LLC, a micro-budgeted curiosity that actually managed to be inventive and very scary. The movie was a word-of-mouth sleeper and was quickly followed by two mediocre sequels. The Carmichael Manor returns to the creepy minimalism of the first Hell House. The plot tells of how the evil from the dreaded Abaddon Hotel infiltrated the country home of a prominent local family—and it’s mostly successful. The film manages to get under your skin on several occasions, and the old “don’t-go-down-the-dark-corridor” standby works surprisingly well. Ultimately, the movie overstays its welcome, something a tighter screenplay and slicker pacing could have helped with in post-production. As it is, Hell House LLC Origins is spooky fun, and best if watched at night. B–
THE NUN II Valak, the demonic entity introduced in The Conjuring 2, is back in this handsome but empty sequel. Several years after sending Valak to Hell (or so she believes) at the end of The Nun, Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) is roped back into the Vatican’s super-secret society of ghostbusting when the immolation of a priest triggers a series of murders in France, 1956. With the help of a young sidekick (Storm Reid), Sister Irene connects the dots and comes to the realization that Valak has possessed a young man named Maurice (Jonas Bloquet) into doing its evil bidding; the demon is using Maurice’s body to uncover the hiding spot of an ancient religious relic known as the eyes of Saint Lucy. None of that is terribly important because it’s the scares that really matter in a movie like this, and The Nun II mostly delivers. Credit should be given to Conjuring Universe regular, Michael Chaves, for creating some effectively creepy moments, including a devil-like goat creature that manifests from a stained glass window and terrorizes an all-girls’ school. By the end, the film emerges as a slick, forgettable byproduct that despite its goes-nowhere screenplay still manages to keep the viewer entertained. B–
SCREAM VI It’s not out of the ordinary for long-running horror franchises to eventually wind up in either (1) space or (2) Manhattan. Going the New York City route, Ghostface targets the bustling avenues of the Big Apple in the latest installment of the Scream series. Picking up a few years after the the events of the last Woodsboro slashings, sisters Sam (Melissa Barrera) and Tara (Jenna Ortega), along with the remainder of their still-breathing friends, leave home for campus life in the big city, only to have their studies interrupted by a new series of Ghostface killings. A step in the right direction after last year’s misguided reboot, Scream VI helps the series feel fresh again—removing the plot (and characters) from Woodsboro is a risk that pays off for most of the runtime. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett offer some terrific suspense set pieces—the makeshift catwalk escape sequence is a highlight—and the gore runs thick and fast. The script, unfortunately, spends too much time on the newer, duller characters and doesn’t give the legacy survivors from past Screams enough screen time; fan-favorite Kirby (Hayden Panettiere) from Scream 4 feels wasted in nothing more than a bit part. By now you’d think the makers of these movies would realize you don’t need that many red herrings! C+
TALK TO ME Mia has problems. Not only is the poor high school student trying to recuperate after the untimely (and mysterious) death of her mother, but she has to deal with the fact her ex-boyfriend, whom she still has romantic feelings for, is now playing Double Tap with Mia’s best friend (Alexandra Jensen). The arrival of an evil specter, which attaches to Mia during a Let’s Get Possessed and Live Stream It party, doesn’t help matters—especially after it claims to be the spirit of Mia’s mom. Played by Sophie Wilde, Mia exudes such a healthy amount of energy and brains within the first act of Talk to Me that it becomes all the more disappointing when she transforms into a complete idiot. That cliched character audiences scream at to not go into the basement? Mia goes into the basement. The same can be said for the film itself. After a good start, the script stumbles and turns into a hodgepodge of murky character motivations and predictability, including an ending you can smell coming a mile away. It often feels, with some of these films, the writers lose interest halfway through working on the script—you know, one of those good concept/poor execution deals. This is all the more disheartening given the overwhelming amount of praise Talk to Me received from critics dubbing it the next great horror flick. It’s not. C
HUESERA: THE BONE WOMAN Not scary, non-horror horror seems to be all the rage with indie filmmakers these days. Much like last year’s equally meandering twosome Nanny and She Will, Huesera: The Bone Woman uses horror as a metaphor to tell a story wrapped so tightly in its cultural beliefs that it forgets to entertain and ends up becoming nothing more than an uninteresting lesson in societal inequality. Valeria (Natalia Solián) is a seemingly happily married young woman expecting her firstborn. She soon begins experiencing bizarre incidents involving a supernatural figure known as the Bone Woman, a Mexican legend that collects the bones of forgotten individuals. In the film, the ghostly manifestation is an obvious allegory of the lack of women’s rights in Mexican culture outside of marriage and motherhood—although this story could be applied to any locale within today’s political climate. It’s an interesting topic that never transcends the horror genre, but instead wallows in its metaphorical hum-drums. C
M3GANBeware the 90-minute movie which has become culturally defined by a meaningless five-second dance number. A hollow rip-off of Child’s Play (and every other killer doll movie ever made), M3GAN was the first horror film released in 2023, and it was not a great start. After her parents are killed in a car accident, young Cady (Violet McGraw) is sent to live with her emotionless Aunt Gemma (Allison Williams), who just happens to work for a massive toy company and is the creator of a cutting-edge, experimental, life-sized animatronic doll called M3GAN (Model 3 Generative Android). When Gemma brings the doll home to test out with Cady, M3GAN begins to act aggressive towards anyone, or anything, that shows any kind of animosity towards the girl. Guess what happens? Unlike Andy and mom Karen in Child’s Play, M3GAN features no sympathetic characters, and that includes kid protagonist Cady, who comes off as just bratty and irrational. Not scary, occasionally funny, and super-predictable, M3GAN is so devoid of original ideas and personality that it creates a vacuum of dry storytelling. It’s the Pumpkin Spice Latte of killer doll movies: it’s basic AF. C–
THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE DEMETER In what is the umpteenth retelling of Dracula, The Last Voyage of the Demeter separates itself from the pack by expanding on a single passage from Bram Stoker’s novel, in which the Count sails from his crumbling castle in the Carpathian Mountains to the lush English countryside. An interesting take on the story, considering most adaptations of Dracula—including the two most famous, Nosferatu (1922) and Dracula (1931)—wisely bypassed the Demeter subplot, mainly because the passage is entirely incidental to the rest of the tale. Last Voyage takes the Demeter section at face value, and in doing so, the movie ends up becoming a failed experiment in mundane storytelling. Despite flagrantly stating the film is based on the Stoker novel in its opening credits, the majority of Last Voyage is a creation of the filmmakers, the plot following a struggling medical doctor (Corey Hawkins) who boards the doomed vessel where he and a handful of halfwit characters must fight off the blood-drinking menace of Dracula (Javier Bolet). Unless you’re a complete novice when it comes to the Dracula legend, Last Voyage of the Demeter offers nothing new to the viewer, except a whole lotta “Who Shot John?” explanations as to why it takes nearly two hours to tell a story that barely has enough material to cover 80 minutes. Adding insult to injury, the movie throws integrity out the window by turning the survivor of the Demeter into a Van Helsingesque caricature for the sole purpose of a sequel. A tale best left to sleep with the fishes. D+
KNOCK AT THE CABINNot-really-horror horror from the increasingly unreliable M. Night Shyamalan, which promises spectacular, apocalyptic destruction but, sadly, never delivers the goods. While on a woodsy vacation, a small family is taken hostage by a quartet of armed people who all claim to share the same vision of the end of the world, which only a sacrifice can stop. Guess who has to make the sacrifice? Plodding and uninvolving, Knock at the Cabin relies so heavily on its “What If?” scenario that it forgets to have any fun with the material. Instead of sympathetic, well-written characters trapped in a doomsday plot (as with Shyamalan’s Signs), the characters in Knock feel like manufactured caricatures written for the purpose of creating inauthentic drama, without the slightest possibility of a genuine outcome. D
DREAM SCENARIO Prof. Matthews (Nicolas Cage), a bald, middle-aged professor who everyone, including his family, treats like a loser for no particular reason, begins to enter the nightmares of those he comes into contact with. Matthews’ nocturnal adventures brings the teacher newfound celebrity, which he exploits in an attempt to gain much-desired admiration within academia. But when his hopes and dreams (so to speak) don’t come to fruition, Matthews’ anger rises, transforming his dream-self into a psychopathic killer. It doesn’t take Einstein—you know, Albert—to understand the heavy-handed symbolism and transparent psychoanalytical subtext in this pseudo-intellectual horror fable. Much like the character of Matthews, the film itself is a black hole of disillusionment, a wannabe satire presented as an insipid political allegory (namely cancel culture). The writers don’t even have fun with the idea of Cage as a modern day Krueger—you know, Freddy—instead placing all of the focus on the satirical elements that feel tired. Like the inevitable erasure of the character of Matthews from society, Dream Scenario is a film best forgotten. D
DRACULA’S WIDOW(1988) Artifacts from Dracula’s castle (including a crate containing the undead body of Dracula’s widow) arrive at a Hollywood wax museum operated by a man who spends his nights in silk pajamas watching a 16mm print of Murnau’s Nosferatu. After Mrs. Dracula, AKA Vanessa (Sylvia Kristel), takes a bite out of the museum owner (Lenny von Dohlen) and turns him into her servant, she immediately goes about Tinseltown sucking the blood out of nearby drunks and sleazoid pick-up artists. A homicide detective (Josef Sommer, fresh off Witness) investigates the bloody trail of mangled victims left by Vanessa while she infiltrates and single-handedly slaughters a cult of muscle-bound devil worshippers. If you’re wondering if any of this is supposed to be taken seriously, rest assured as Dracula’sWidow is done tongue-in-cheek. Most of the cast plays the film with a smirk, including Stefan Schnabel, whose modern day Van Helsing takes delight in staking vampires as they lay unconscious in the morgue. But the entire movie rests on the padded shoulders of Kristel, whose acting choice is to play the role more like an extraterrestrial who just landed on Earth than a centuries-old vampire. Moments of colorful visual flair by director Christopher Coppola (Nicolas Cage’s brother) and a sense of love for old monster movies aren’t enough to lift Dracula’s Widow out from mediocrity. C
ICED (1989) A group of personality-free friends—much like the Power Rangers, the only way to tell them apart is by the different colors they wear—invited to the grand opening of new ski resort, Snow Peak, are stalked and massacred by a killer in a ski suit and goggles. The airheads are dispatched in the usual slasher movie fashion, i.e. eye-gougings, electrocutions, and one guy who gets shredded by a snow plow (the only flash of originality in the movie). Does all of this mayhem have something to do with the death of a scorned lover four years earlier during a similar ski weekend? The specifically-placed newspaper clipping of the four-year-old accident in one character’s bedroom says “yes.” Most of these dolts don’t make the connection between their traumatic past and the murders until it’s too late—for the characters and the viewer. Iced is too bloodless to appeal to splatter fans, and too dull to appeal to, well, anyone, making its 86 minutes feel interminable. For the bad movie lover, however, Iced is passable garbage. Great title. C–
LADY FRANKENSTEIN(1971) Baron Frankenstein (Joseph Cotton) successfully creates life in the form of a murderous monster, and in consequence is crushed to death by his creation. Believing she can tame the psychopathic creature, the Baron’s daughter, Tania (Rosalba Neri), with the help of her husband (Paul Muller), takes over her father’s work. Meanwhile, the creature (Riccardo Pizzuti) roams the countryside and, in what could possibly be a perverse homage to James Whale’s Frankenstein, comes across a couple having sex and subsequently tosses the naked woman into a river where she drowns. After a lot of chit-chat, numerous bared breasts, and a needless police investigation storyline that reeks of plot padding, Lady Frankenstein tires of her husband’s nay-saying, kills him, and implants his brain into the body of a young stableboy—do I sense an anti-feminist message here? One of several Frankenstein bloodbaths made in Italy in the seventies, LadyFrankenstein has all the hallmarks of a Hammer film—lavish sets, bodacious women, beautiful locations—but drowns in overblown performances, slack pacing, and some truly terrible makeup FX. It’s also overlong and lacks a single sympathetic character. At least Frankenstein ’80 was bad in an enjoyable kinda way. D
House of the Long Shadows – 1983, UK, 101m. Director: Pete Walker. Streaming: Tubi
King Kong – 1933, US, 100m. Director: Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack. Streaming: Max
BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS(1970) Staten Island’s own Andy Milligan (The Rats Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here!) once again returned to his beloved England for this splatter movie variation on the Sweeney Todd story. Fleet Street’s Mrs. Lovett (Jane Hilary) gifts her London neighborhood with ample meat pies, the contents of which are supplied by Sweeney Todd (John Miranda). But Todd isn’t a butcher in the normal sense of the word—Sweeney is a womanizing barber who murders his clients and sends the remains to Mrs. Lovett’s oven. Expect a lot of non-acting, rough editing, harsh lighting, third-rate makeup effects, and absence of any kind of story or character structure. In other words, a typical Milligan production. Funniest scene: after a woman walks in on the carnage in Mrs. Lovett’s cellar, she heaves and vomits on a police inspector. Stephen Sondheim need not worry. D–
HOUSE OF THE LONG SHADOWS(1983) Kenneth Magee (Desi Arnaz Jr.), an arrogant American writer on tour in London, makes a $25,000 bet with his publisher that he can whip up an epic novel better than Wuthering Heights in twenty-four hours. In order to get the full gothic experience, Kenneth’s publisher suggests he travel to the Welsh countryside and an abandoned manor where Kenneth can get the inspiration for his new masterpiece. But instead of an empty house Kenneth discovers the place filled with the eccentric Grisbane family, including Lionel Grisbane (Vincent Price), who’s just returned to his ancestral home after having been away for decades. More members of the Grisbane clan arrive, as well as the mysterious Corrigan (Christopher Lee), who claims he’s purchased the property for demolition. Oh, there’s also a secret, murderous Grisbane who’s been locked away since they were fourteen and is now running amok. It’s fun to see some of horror’s most iconic faces together—Peter Cushing and John Carradine round out the cast—and the writers were obviously paying tribute to the “old dark house” chillers of yesteryear. There is some blood towards the end, but those expecting a typically gory Pete (The Flesh and Blood Show) Walker vehicle will be disappointed in House of the Long Shadow‘s restrained handling of the material. Ironically, the movie would have benefited from some additional splatter to fill in the plot holes and the somewhat meandering screenplay. C+
KING KONG (1933) One of the most iconic films of all time, this RKO classic still holds up today as a genuine masterwork of special FX storytelling. An expedition headed by infamous explorer/filmmaker Carl Denham (Robert Armstrong) to an exotic, isolated piece of land referred to as Skull Mountain—Skull Island would become the more popular name in subsequent sequels and remakes—runs smack into Kong, a mammoth ape-like creature that develops eyes for Carl’s newest starlet, Ann Darrow (original Scream Queen, Fay Wray). After a brisk jungle adventure where Carl and his merry crew of camera operators and seamen run afoul of dinosaurs, pythons, and other toothy terrors, Carl gases Kong and brings him back to New York City to star in the Carl Denham Production of “King Kong: The Eighth Wonder of the World.” To the surprise of nobody, Kong breaks free and wreaks havoc in the busy city streets—and kills a lot of people in the processes—eventually culminating to the movie’s famous Empire State Building climax. With its seamless mix of groundbreaking special effects work, crackerjack pacing, and general excitement, King Kong remains a magical experience and precursor to the modern blockbuster. A–
The Video Verdict, a movie podcast I cohost with Frank Pittarese, is now available on Spotify! Listen to our latest episode on King Kong!
Delirium – 1979, US, 88m. Director: Peter Maris. Streaming: Tubi
Primeval – 2007, US, 93m. Director: Michael Katleman. Streaming: N/A
Sugar Hill – 1974, US, 91m. Director: Paul Maslansky. Streaming: AMC/Prime, Freevee
DELIRIUM(1979) A Vietnam vet (Nick Panouzis) snaps and goes on a killing spree in St. Louis. His first victim is a woman he impales—and pins to a door—with a tribal spear decoration he removes from the wall. The next casualty is a poor schnook he picks up after stealing a car. He drowns her in a nearby body of water, but not before she removes all her clothes for what she believes is a lesson in skinny-dipping. Turns out Panouzis is really a contract killer gone rogue—working for some kind of shadow government and trying to clean up the city by exterminating the criminal element (an idea later revisited in the Hollywood thriller, The Star Chamber). Delirium is a strictly amateur production and its shoestring budget is often noticeable, especially during Panouzis’s Vietnam flashback sequences—obviously shot in the Missouri countryside, and looking nothing remotely like Southeast Asia. Despite these setbacks, the film does offer a few surprises and better acting than you’d expect from such a low-budget affair. Not bad, but not exactly good, either. Stock music from the British TV show Mastermind is sporadically used throughout. C+
PRIMEVAL(2007) Two unconvincing news reporters (Dominic Purcell and Orlando Jones) and their babealicious producer (Brooke Langton) are sent to the jungles of Africa to follow the trail of carnage created by a legendary crocodile the locals have named Gustav. Once in Burundi, the Americans meet up with a Steve Irwin wannabe (Gideon Emery), who wants to capture the croc for monetary gain, and a big game hunter (Jürgen Prochnow) looking for revenge on the reptile that ate his wife. Gustav’s reign of bloodshed creates the perfect cover for a local serial killer, dubbed Little Gustav. It comes to the surprise of nobody when Big Gustav chomps Little Gustav in half, saving our heroes from a gory demise. Despite its shortcomings, Primeval is amusing enough to hold interest, even when the plot descends into a rip-off of Jaws, Jurassic Park, and many other nature-gone-awry movies. But your interest can only be held for so long, especially during endless generic action scenes that take up way too much of the movie’s relatively short runtime. Hokey computer FX and a lack of suspense keep the film from being at all memorable. C
SUGAR HILL (1974) Diana “Sugar” Hill (Marki Bey) wants revenge for the murder of her boyfriend at the hands of violent crime lord Morgan (Robert Quarry) and his band of hoodlums. Instead of using a gun, Sugar seeks the help of a voodoo priestess (future Mother Jefferson, Zara Cully), who summons the Lord of the Dead (Don Pedro Colley) and his army of killer zombies. Sugar is subsequently transformed into an afro-sporting Bad Ass and, with zombies on hand, goes about dispatching Quarry’s goons. At times Sugar Hill‘s script feels stretched a bit too thin, with a subplot involving Sugar’s ex-beau, a cop, getting in the way of the film’s main attraction. But it’s hard not to enjoy the film’s supernatural ambience mixed with the justice-seeking kick-assery. It’s no Blacula, but Sugar Hill is a worthy entry in the seventies exploitation market. B–
Char Man – 2019, US, 85m. Director: Kurt Ela, Kip Tribble. Streaming: Tubi
Home Movie – 2008, US, 77m. Director: Christopher Denham. Streaming: Tubi
The Pyramid – 2014, Morocco/US, 88m. Director: Grégory Levasseur. Streaming: Max
CHAR MAN(2019) Looking to make a splash in the world of low-budget documentaries, three friends and wannabe filmmakers venture into the wilds of Southern California to film a semi-serious documentary on an urban legend about the so-called Ojai Vampire. The trio’s obviously amateurish skill level takes its toll when none of the men can seem to form a coherent idea about what exactly the movie should focus on. That is until they interview an Ojai historian (Jeff Kober) who informs them of an even better local legend: the Char Man, a sinister name given to a resident who decades earlier murdered his father and was savagely burned in a wildfire. The legend is if you call out for help when you’re in the Char Man’s woods, he’ll come for you. Despite this being the umpteenth movie dealing with a very similar story of woodsy supernatural vengeance, Char Man works (for the most part) thanks to likable characters and a sense of humor. The film’s unsettling aspects largely play out in the mythology surrounding the legend, but the movie as a whole is never truly scary. Still, this is a harmless bit of low-fi, found footage fun for hardcore fans. B–
HOME MOVIE(2008) The lives of the parents of a pair of mischievous twins begins to come undone when the siblings dial their inappropriate behavior up a notch. The boy, Jack (Austin Williams), throws dinner plates around, while his sister, Emily (Amber Joy Williams), kills a frog in a vice. None of this is particularly interesting, or surprising, to the viewer since the two children are presented as oddballs the second the film opens. The father (Adrian Pasdar), a minster, is too busy practicing his sermons on-camera—and generally acting like a buffoon—to notice the children’s behavior, while the mother (Cady McClain), despite being a child psychologist, doesn’t seem bothered at all by her kids’ unnatural personalities. I’m not sure if this is the result of lazy writing on the filmmaker’s part, or an intentionally bad character trait. Either way, by the halfway point you won’t really care as Home Movie is utterly predictable and descends into every cliche torn from the found footage handbook. Contrived and about as scary as watching your Aunt Edna’s home movies. D
THE PYRAMID(2014) American archeologists stumble upon a buried, unexplored pyramid in the middle of the Egyptian desert. A father-daughter team of explorers are desperate to uncover an entrance into the underground monument, despite the fact the land is being engulfed in Arab Spring-like protests. They’re repeatedly told by their colleagues of impending danger—a warning confirmed when a poor Arabian porter is met with a blast of toxic gas released from the dig site and his face becomes hideously scarred—but the show must go on. Archeologist Dad (Denis O’Hare) and Daughter (Ashley Hinshaw) get their nervous team to journey to the center of the pyramid, where they’re immediately embroiled in bad air, falling debris, and eventually become a food source for some sort of ancient Bastet creature. All of this is flatly presented with no suspense or surprises, giving the viewer very little reason to care about what happens. The execution of the story can only be described as lazy as the filmmakers present a POV/found-footage setup at the beginning of the film but drop it whenever it’s convenient to the writing. The end credits are the only positive thing The Pyramid can offer its audience. F
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein– 1948, US, 83m. Director: Charles Barton. Streaming: N/A
Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man – 1943, US, 73m. Director: Roy William Neill. Streaming: Peacock
House of Frankenstein– 1944, US, 71m. Director: Erle C. Kenton. Streaming: N/A
ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN(1948) Two bungling baggage handlers in the form of radio and television stars Bud Abbott and Lou Costello get wrapped in a supernatural plot involving Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster, and the Wolf Man. Abbott and Costello—here called Chick and Wilbur—intercept two crates containing the bodies of Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) and the Monster (Glenn Strange) en route to a wax museum called McDougal’s House of Horrors. Chick and Wilbur are told by Lawrence Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr.) that Dracula wants to steal his brain and implant it in Frankenstein’s Monster and requests the two lug nuts help him foil Dracula’s plan. Perhaps the best of the Universal Monster team-ups, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein is a towering achievement because it works as both a horror flick and a comedy—it never feels as if the filmmakers, or Abbott and Costello themselves, are making fun of the characters. They’re not laughing at them but with them, and believe me, folks—there’s a difference! In many ways this is a better monster movie than many of the legitimate horror releases that came before it, and it delivers the monster action in spades, especially during its breathlessly paced final fifteen minutes. The last-minute surprise appearance by another famous character will leave you in stitches. A must-see for any monster lover. A–
FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN(1943) The first of Universal’s Wolf Man sequels (but the fourth for Frankenstein), this picks up four years after the events of The Wolf Man (1941) with sad sack, and presumably dead, Lawrence Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr.) being resurrected from his coffin when a couple of dimwitted grave robbers remove the bedding of wolf’s bane. Talbot, still unhappy to be saddled with his curse, seeks help from Maleva (Maria Ouspenskaya), whose son was the werewolf which turned Talbot into a monster. Believing Dr. Frankenstein can put Talbot to death permanently, Maleva brings Talbot to the doctor’s castle, where they discovers the body of the Creature (Bela Lugosi) beneath the ruins of the place. One of the first of the monster mash-ups that were popular in the forties—the trend would peak with Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein in 1948—and featuring a terrific turn by Chaney Jr., who only hinted at his potential in the original film. Unfortunately, Lugosi’s reputation precedes him in a performance that displays his obvious discomfort in the role of the Creature. To be fair, however, Lugosi’s overuse of outstretched arms is because of story continuity error—this version of the Creature was originally written as being blind, an element later excised from the finished film. Despite its limitations, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man is a whole lotta fun and delivers plenty of monster mayhem for the avid fan. B+
HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN(1944) Boris Karloff returns to the Frankenstein universe, not as the Monster but as murderous scientist Gustav Niemann, who after escaping from prison promises his deformed assistant, Daniel (J. Carrol Naish, later stepping into the role of Dr. Frankenstein in the Al Adamson crap classic Dracula vs. Frankenstein), a new body by using Dr. Frankenstein’s formula for creating life. This plan is really a ruse for Niemann to exact revenge on the people who put the doctor in jail for grave robbery years earlier—his devious plot is to give the men who testified against him Lawrence Talbot’s (Lon Chaney Jr.) werewolf curse. Talbot, along with Frankenstein’s Monster (Glenn Strange), are exhumed from the rubble of Castle Frankenstein (which was destroyed at the end of Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man) and with the help of gypsy woman, Ilonka (Elena Verdugo), undergo Niemann’s experiments so they’ll come under his control. Ilonka eventually falls in love with Talbot, which sends the smitten Daniel into a jealous rage. Dracula (John Carradine) makes a brief appearance early on and offers the film the most excitement in the form of a spectacular carriage chase. Talbot’s ongoing moping over his werewolf curse continues, but here it’s not as interesting, or as fleshed out, as in the previous Wolf Man sagas. House of Frankenstein has the dubious feeling of being nothing more than a flashy byproduct of ideas stitched together from other movies. But for most of its short runtime, the movie is a welcoming way of passing the time, especially for the monster maniac. B–
