1/2
A team of “scientists” may be inept to all hell but they do manage to catch the legendary chupacabra. The chupacabra here is some rubber-masked goon in a ragged robe. It is both cheap and lovely. The creature is held at the team’s secret facility which just so happens to be set up in the Amityville house. Yes. They have built a secret facility in that infamous piece of Long Island property. Don’t question it. It has happened and we just have to deal with it. Biohazard stickers are placed on clothing and cheap lab materials so we know it’s a fucking lab set up in the Amityville house. “Scientists” stiffly discuss tests in the backyard, on a porch swing. They explain that they’re testing the effects of paranormal energies in the proximity of their captured monster. This is why they have rented the Amityville house. See! There’s all the reason you need! One young scientist has a psychic premonition on the colleague he has the hots for being chased by the chupacabra. He doesn’t warn her but he does ask her out and she accepts. Unwarned, the Spirit Halloween fiend manages to escape after puking plastic bugs on the girl who was supposed to be prepping it for the next experiment. Looks like that coffee date won’t be happening. The scientists argue about one of their number being a spy and that’s concerning but more concerning is the escaped monster roaming around the house/lab. What follows are boring conversations performed by a few generations of AV club members in the cramped setting of a suburban home while footage of a Halloween store monster roaming around randomly hits. The head of the program arrives and she is one cold bitch with a stick up her ass and a problem with annunciating every fucking thing she says. She’s demanding a sit-rep before she sends in a clean up task force. Neck tattoos, comfortable living room seating, lockdown protocols that make no sense, heavy breathing, a security guard with a “S.W.A.T. cop” hat, dialogue written by a possibly mentally challenged AI program, lab coats, repeated plot points, action presented through dialogue, the world’s most pathetic storage room, a very loud tattoo-covered hunter with an eyepatch, melodramatics by gunpoint in a laundry room, a pathetic knife fight and some truly unlikable people (way to kill off the only likable idiot first, you stupid fucking movie) add up for one ass-numbing experience. Seventy minutes end up feeling like four days in the hottest moments of August spent in a small room with people you hate and no air conditioning. A boring, irritating mess. If you fast forward through the majority of the film it still blows donkey dicks. Saved from the oblivion of zero stars thanks to its cheap-ass monster (that rarely shows up), the last act “evil” return of the only likable character and plenty of wood paneling.
aka Amityville 1993: The Image of Evil/Amityville 7
⭐️⭐️
The ever-transforming Amityville series had spiraled out from the infamous Long Island home for a few years already at this point. Presenting evil in some common areas, be it a clock or lamp. It also gave us a confessional booth but I think only a few weirdos have gotten their hands on one of those and stored it in their basement. The series has also blessed us with Josh Brolin’s beard, Margot Kidder’s shocking sexiness and Burt Young’s general awfulness. We left “celebrities” behind a little bit ago but the 1993 entry managed to get some star power back into the fold with David Naughton, Richard Roundtree and Terry O’Quinn… granted this is my kind of “celebrity”, so I doubt the budget was stretched that far. Also this time around it’s a mirror causing issues, so the trifecta of household essentials is complete… still waiting on a toilet to turn up possessed but I have yet to fall down the modern-era Amityville sewer so I’m hoping I won’t have to wait long… we did get a vibrator already and that ended up being a blast. A struggling photographer is gifted an antique mirror by a homeless man he snaps. Of course, this mirror comes from that aforementioned lakeside home in Long Island and of course that damn thing is evil as all fuck. Keyes Terry brings it home to his loft and its evil starts running rampant through the studio complex he shares with a few other artists after his neighbor takes his girlfriend up on the offer to keep it. Horrific reflections lead to nasty deaths. The mirror isn’t the only thing with a connection to Amityville and Keyes slowly realizes his heritage is pretty damn troublesome. Pompous artist-talk horrifies more than any shock the film throws your way, a demon comes out of a painting and the lovely Lin Shaye briefly graces us with her presence. David Naughton is great as the yuppie landlord, Terry O’Quinn unsurprisingly steals every scene he’s in as a detective and our hero looks like a discount Dermot Mulroney. The whole story doesn’t have much steam but the supporting characters add a little spice and make it watchable.
⭐️⭐️1/2
Native American curses suck. But what we did to incur those curses sucks way more. A backwoods Michigan town and the connection it holds to the haunted titular Indian burial ground draws a psychiatrist off of his leave of absence to do some investigating. Town librarian Lori Coker has just returned from Bone Hill a raving lunatic (“Mother Earth must be cured! The Chief of the hill must fight the angry spirit! That which is good must prevail!” she screams this while brandishing a ceremonial dagger) and our psychiatrist hero Wade (who had stepped away following the death of his wife… hit that overdramatic flashback!) attempts to help the girl. Strange bloodwork intrigues Wade and he’s sure there is more going on than just trauma. His sessions with Lori leads to investigating the burial ground and puts him on a collision course with supernatural danger and possession. Lori’s uncle is a tribal elder so he’ll be around to fill in any backstory we need (hit that lovely budget-conscious digital animation folklore!) in case we don’t want to read along with Wade’s online research. Rituals, world-ending evil and sacrifice are all in the cards. Sheriff Barney Howe (Roger Callard, who was Conan the Librarian in UHF) is hanging around and looks like some bronzer exploded on his face (hey, it works for him) and was smart enough to avoid his magical mustache. The fine folkloric foundation to the horror is rendered completely silly thanks to a production that feels like it belongs to one of those educational dramas your substitute teacher would have the class watching in middle school. There’s a script with heart and thought put into it but it’s just so damn corny it’s a bit embarrassing. Luckily, I find that charming and preferable to those mean-spirited endurance tests or the even less enjoyable toilet-humored idiotics of those who have an inability to tell a story that pollute the genre. Some rubbery gore, a wonderfully realized monster (if you got a soft spot for Savage Harvest) and the world’s least convincing FBI agent (well, at least until recently) make things a bit more fun. The film tries its damndest and I will not crap all over anything that gives as much of a shit as this flick does. Granted, if I were in a classroom some thirty years ago, I’d probably be snickering and rolling my eyes at my friends.
aka Don’t Look Back (that’s the English translation but like most English translations, it’s way less sexy)
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Childhood homes always have trauma in the kind of cinema I prefer to spend my time with. It seems every building you grew up in should be torched to the foundation once you manage to free yourself of it. But alas, instead of breaking the shackles of the past, horror protagonists always manage to make their way back “home”. Two estranged siblings, Aurora and Martín, with a ton of baggage (naturally) reluctantly return home after their senile mother’s elderly caretaker (maybe a stretch, a neighbor who checks in on her) suffers a fatal fall off of a stool. They rarely talk about the risks of grocery placement and cabinet repair but now you know. Aurora notices that every picture in the home has had their father’s head cut out of them but she doesn’t seem all that upset by it, so I’m guessing he was a piece of shit. This probably explains why Aurora now finds herself with another abusive piece shit as her boyfriend. Mom’s diminishing mental state has Martín floating the idea to his sister that their mother come live with her. He claims she can’t come live with him due to his “roommate’s” cat and mom’s allergies. Me thinks Martín has learned to be closeted and has had a few “roommates” in his life. Repression of youthful memories raises some questions as to just how bad things got before papa passed on, quick flashbacks intruding on the present are equally unsettling. As is the mother’s insistence that dad is there even though dad’s been dead for decades. The siblings are going to discover that mental illness explains some things but the supernatural may be the actual answer as to just how bad everything has gotten. Both are equally disturbing and depressing. Martín feels he needs to confront the past he can’t remember in order to be a better person but Aurora seems to just want to leave that past buried which, considering the glimpses and hints we’ve been given, may not be best for her mental health but is completely understandable. Dad’s weird-ass household rule gives the film its title and also may have assisted in his untimely (but much-deserved) demise. Pity he had to go and fuck up his kids. A well-crafted slow burn first half offers some suitable spookiness sticking to the background and a crumbling home serving as a proper setting but more importantly placed in the capable hands of Paulette Hernandez and Alan Alarcón who manage to present the familiar charisma of siblings and remain sympathetic throughout. When the deceased father’s evil presence takes hold things get a little silly and you know I am completely fine with that. Emotional trauma in the form of evil specters is nothing new and this is a perfectly fine tread through familiar waters with a vicious streak and a climax that gets weird enough to be memorable.
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Filmmaker Jamie Grefe may have access to my wish journal. How else can you explain this title? Now, the movie… this may be something nobody wished for. A woman slowly scampers around a home that may be the vacation rental set of telenovela, suffering from severe constipation or maybe trying keep anything from noticing her. She quietly calls over a younger woman who is dressed like she should be on her way to a Stomp the Yard style competition. They’re both pretty frightened or constipated. A third young woman creeps behind a chair, looking around the room. The trio quietly join together and exit the dining room they were in. Well, two of them do. The Stomp the Yard girl joins them in returning to the room she was just in. This is not a great way to spend the first seven minutes of your sixty-one minute movie. But I’m an old fashioned sort that likes things to happen in his entertainment. All together now, they whisper and direct via hand movements while still slowly lumbering around the place. Slow motion sneaking, sitting and staring further drags things out. The reason for their inactive activeness and unsympathetic twelve minutes of inanity? Well, it seems to be there’s someone hanging around outside with a dirty burlap sack over their head. But please don’t take this revelation to mean we are done with watching the three women slowly move around their surroundings. No. There’s plenty more of that in store. The mother (I assume as she is rocking some mom jeans) hides her girls away in a room and continues to look around (or be constipated). One of the daughters leaves the other daughter to go find their mother after a few seconds of being separated. Why is this happening? Curtains are pulled back in slow motion, ol’ sack-head peeps through windows, deep breaths are taken (also in slow motion), Stomp the Yard girl (Lydia) claims to feel a presence, mom attempts to keep things under control (Man, those mom jeans are super tight. If she farts, she will blow her shoes off), sack-head (I think he’s supposed to be the chupacabra) creeps around the lovely backyard, in camera effects paint things with a layer of surrealism that feels a few decades out of place, Lydia (sometimes Lidia in the subtitles) calls on The Weeping Woman for assistance (it causes her to go cross-eyed… ACTING!), the director himself portrays the softly wailing La Llorona (realized by a face-covering black wig, sensible t-shirt/dress and shoulder strap (?) combo), the longest strangulation in film history happens and soon (well, not “soon” as we humans think of it) we’re left with the realization that the lackluster legends are never going to confront each other. No reason is given and no minute is not stretched out into oblivion. Jamie Grefe had a dream but sadly the most impressive part of that dream was a title because everything else was shoved through quickly drying wet cement and rendered through a misremembered filmmaking tutorial by Jean Rollin’s bored ghost. The truly sad thing about me, is that the rhythmic hum of the whole experience eventually entranced me much like even the most ass-numbing work of that French director. Three attractive women and two legends join together in a repetitive ramble of a film that I probably enjoyed a hell of a lot more than many people should. Is Jamie Grefe the new Jean Rollin? Probably but he’s working within the budgetary confines of an early Polonia flick without the sexual hangups and youthful obsession with splatter. So maybe Grefe is more like Wim Vink but with attractive friends and a better grasp on how to do nothing.
⭐️⭐️
A gaggle of adventurous dopes leave the comfort of New York to explore one of their friend’s heritage on the island of Borneo. Deep in the jungle, shit goes south and now survival is all that matters. Outside of the natural horrors contained within any tropical hellscape, there’s plenty of talk about headhunters who lay claim to the dense and tangled vegetation. It’s found footage so at least we can take comfort in knowing these annoying dopes come to a well-deserved end. Plenty of tourist footage of these dinks enjoying Malaysia forces us to spend time with the group who range from mildly pleasant to extremely punchable. Luckily the focal point, Henry, is pretty charming and it’s even a little sweet when we see him reconnect with his estranged family. Too bad he wants to journey deeper into his past and that requires a trip to the jungles his people call home. Listen. I get writing off your vacation expenses by claiming you were making a film but more than fifty fucking minutes of your eighty minute movie being dedicated to shit I wouldn’t want to watch people I know doing is just a little infuriating. The cast is all solid enough (although there is faltering when heavier dramatics are called for) which helps keep things moving but moving through nothing is still making the audience participate in nothing. The jungle is finally entered and shit finally gets interesting because I’m never going to not be impressed by the sights and sounds of the fucking jungle. The group is stalked by something that remains just out of vision and the encroaching dread begins to weigh on the attitude of the friends and semi-annoying derps become full-blown insufferable assbags. A missing guide and poor decisions lead to being lost in the jungle and then finally coming face to face with a threat that’s hiding in the trees. It gets points for where it sets the last-act thrills and it’s easy to pull off an invisible enemy when there’s that much darkness and forest surrounding you… so I begrudgingly applaud that. It’s still way too much vacation and not enough entertainment.
aka Uncle Ray’s Cabin
⭐️1/2
A group of bubbly sorority girls take a little vacation to a family cabin, bringing their boy-toys with ‘em. Unfortunately for our busty and lovely heroines, there’s a few wrenches thrown into the weekend that should be filled with fun, sun, sex and booze. One of those is a recently escaped convict hiding out in the area. The other problem (and a much bigger one to boot) is the company of one of the girls’ cabin-owner uncle. Annoying as the presence of an adult may be, worse is the Native American spirit that has possessed old Uncle Ray and the appetite for blood said spirit harbors. Why is Uncle Ray possessed? It’s a fair question, my inquisitive friend, but hardly important when it comes to a boob-filled horror flick but since you asked nicely, I’ll let you in on it. He’s been digging up ancient artifacts no matter how much local woodsman Tex (Uncle Leo himself Len Lesser) has warned against it. Geeky Sarah (she wears sweaters and has glasses… WHAT A NERD!) is tagging along and is obviously set up to be the hero of the thing… at least that would be the case if anyone actually gave a fuck about any of the characters. Uncle Ray turns into a rubbery monster that looks like it got cut from Spookies, Uncle Leo wanders around the property with a shotgun, boobs are in abundance and the manhunt is on. One helpful good samaritan rambles on about fish after coming to the rescue of Sarah and her friend when their car dies and a biker ex-boyfriend shows up. There’s a lot going on but it still feels like not much is happening. Sure there’s boobs and a little blood but there’s no heart. Throw in the acting prowess of sentient lumber for almost everyone involved and ya got a film better left to obscurity.
