Reap of Evil (1994) (USA)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

A one-sided conversation about taxes leads to snakes burrowing in the face… but it’s all a dream! A group of friends play gin rummy and the mortician of the group discusses some particularly nasty cases and then they discuss the nightmares they’ve been having. They sound horrifying but since they’re being explained and not shown by a group of guys who are better-suited to ring you up for your 1 AM beer run, the impact lands somewhere short of effective. Mark (who looks like me if I were your dad in the 80s) has recently lost his wife and the grief is leading to suicidal thoughts. His friends are worried about him… hit those words of reassurance and discussion between significant others. Mortician dude has a wife and child and he’s concerned about Mark. Mark’s sister pays him a visit and mentions a priest that’s been stopping by her work at the hospital (?), possibly an asylum. More low-fi nightmares hit. Footage of ducks in a pond pops on the screen and in the corner an intertitle reads “3rd day”. Thank god they let me know! We rejoin our priest in a meeting with a couple other men of the cloth (one of them in an old man mask) and he’s concerned there’s a coverup going on. Two holy men are dead and one has been institutionalized. The Six Flags priest (MORE ABSTINENCE! MORE FUN!) dismisses him and then cryptically mentions an inevitable horrificness on the horizon. The next scene has a demon rip off a priest’s head. It’s all quick cuts, muddy darkness and indecipherable red lights… it’s pretty awesome. Off to the morgue and a graphic autopsy on a less than convincing body. The woman wakes up while her chest has been opened up… it’s another nightmare! The fourth day hits and a building explodes in New York City. We’re treated to real unedited footage of a disaster. The priest has visions of a demonic face in the middle of an electronics store and almost faints. More talk! Someone’s husband is dead and the mortician guy knows the wife. A coin flip decides who has to call her. The woman goes to the morgue (which more than resembles a kitchen at a fast food joint) to see her husband, mortician dude walks in, tries to talk to her and eats a shovel for his troubles. A blonde pays a visit to the priest and seduces him but he’s able to resist. We’re only a little more than a half-hour into this and things are just getting muddier. There’s another demon attack and (I think) a baby in a trash bag, this is immediately followed by a skeleton coming to life and molesting a sleeping woman. Said woman nonchalantly pushes the corpse off and goes to calm her nerves in the bathroom. While sitting on the toilet, she explodes. I’m exhausted. The world slips into impossible-to-navigate darkness and all hell breaks loose. This means maggots, face-ripping, dismemberment, a whole lot of exposition from a demon reading from cue cards which sort of explains things and a climax which brings to mind a lethargic Olaf Ittenbach set piece. It’s like an analog stream of consciousness acid trip that’s edging out your heroin overdose and populated with people you lost contact with after high school. Stop-motion monsters, nasty basement violence, and audio recorded in a paint can left in the depths of Hell are all wrapped up in a needlessly complicated but charmingly enthusiastic package. I loved it but I’m not sure if I’ll ever watch it again.

Flight to Hell (2003) (Italy)

⭐️⭐️⭐️

I don’t want to believe that this was a labor of love from Alvaro Passeri but I’m at a loss to see where he thought there was any profit to be made in this film. It was three years before Snakes on a Plane would be a surprise box office hit and outside of the obvious Alien franchise love, some nods to The Thing and creatures that come off as a somehow less believable version of those flesh-eating “turd-ants” from the Canadian zero-budget masterpiece Things, I’m just scratching my head at how this was anything but a project born of love. But this is not love as we know it. This is a love corrupted to the point of rot. This kind of love does not inspire poetry or song, it inspires a trip to the clinic to get some bloodwork done. Captain Don wakes from a horrible nightmare and realizes he is running late for his flight. He rushes through his routine and heads to work. He captains the Roulette One. It’s a private flying casino owned by a dude named Mike who has everything rigged to swindle rich high stakes gamblers who prefer to lose their cash in the sky unlike all us other poor schmucks who go broke on solid ground. The rest of the crew consists of two technicians (who work as game riggers/handymen), an irresponsible co-pilot, and two stewardesses and all of them are in on Mike’s scheme. The clientele for this trip is two rich dudes and their trophy girls. Every one of them is going to come to regret getting on this flight. While the usual hijinks of the horny crew play out, something odd is happening in outer space. There’s been some kind of hatching and the plane is on course to fly through a strange neon green fog filled with spores. The spores make their way into the plane and in almost no time there is a green goo over all the important things that keep the Roulette One operational. Mechanical malfunctions begin to cause problems but the worst has yet to show its ugly face. Seems the green slime is full of eggs and these eggs are ready to hatch. The shit really hits the fan when the plane becomes infested with computer generated little lizard-bug things that can morph through solid objects, turn invisible and infect humans. One technician is unfortunate enough to get one up his nose and eventually bursting out of his eye! The leaping little bastards aren’t the only threat either, there’s also a big puppet thing residing in the cargo bay and munching on anyone unfortunate enough to cross its path. Yeah, there’s quite a bit going down in this stinky piece of Italian cheese but if you have no sense of humor ya best just look away. I’d say almost eighty percent of the set is green screen and it never comes close to looking believable. We get “lucky” with some digitally rendered special effects but most of the stuff is brought to life with piss-poor cgi. The acting is awful all across the board (it was performed in English [maybe with some hope of international sales] so all the dialogue sounds a bit off) and none of the gore really hits thanks to crappy SFX. If you’re in the right state of mind you may just have a blast with it but there’s very little to recommend if you’re hunting down some serious horror shenanigans. It’s complete crap but the disturbing idea that it was a passion project makes it easier to swallow.

Party Night (2017) (USA)

⭐️1/2

Three couples ditch the official after-prom party and have their own celebration at the secluded lake house of one of their uncles. In between all the angsty teen dramatics, a large bohunk in a blank mask with a big-ass machete starts picking ‘em off. It’s your standard stalk and slash with the added bonus of completely unlikable protagonists. The kids stick around waiting for their friends to turn up, plenty of red stuff spills and the mystery behind a string a disappearances in the area is solved. A dull 70 minutes.

fuji_jukai.mov (2016) (Japan)

⭐️⭐️⭐️

A team doing a report on the disturbing amount of suicides that take place within a beautiful forest under the shadow of Mt. Fuji come across a discarded cellphone. The footage from said phone is edited together with eyewitness accounts to present a full length feature. Teenage Ami journeys out to the Aokigahara Forest, planning to take her own life. A truly gorgeous location to put an end to the unfathomable sadness that some people cannot escape from. Two other teenage girls, Mi-tan and Hinata, join her after she invites anyone who is curious to come and see her take her own life. The whole plan being for them to upload her final footage for her. Mi-tan seems a bit excited (and slightly insane) and Hinata has a real quiet sociopath vibe to her but I think Ami is just content she won’t be alone in her final moments. The three girls trek through the woods, getting to know each other and building a dynamic that just feels off. Well, obviously because all of them are there for pretty awful reasons on the awful reasons spectrum. The deeper they travel into the vast ocean of trees, the more things begin to feel off, besides the natural offness you would expect to find in a place so beautiful yet soaked in that much sadness. Eventually, the inevitability sinks in and something it begins to feel like there’s a purposefully obscure layer running just out of grip behind this trek in the woods. The discovery of a corpse destroys some confidence and curiosity takes a backseat to fear. It also causes the girls to flee from their path, which sucks when there’s so much woods to get lost in. Night falls, a village deep in the forest is stumbled across and the truth comes out. The main crux of the footage is shot on iPhone and it works pretty well, interviews with locals and people familiar with the location add a nice bit of backstory to things that our main characters couldn’t have offered up without feeling completely out of place. It builds a solid atmosphere to the slow-burning dread and hits a few disturbing notes… that livestream moment is a fucking cringe-inducing heart punch. The film offers up a lot more than expected at 84 minutes but it also drags as it lulls in some spots. Thankfully the setting is a major advantage and makes it a bit easier to look past a plot that can’t really fill the runtime and is plenty familiar. It also doesn’t fumble the ending which is a worry that comes along with all found footage and mockumentaries.

The Ascent (2019) (UK)

aka Black Ops/Stairs

⭐️⭐️

A special ops squad, going by the name of Hell’s Bastards, are sent into a war torn stretch of the world to retrieve some intel. Upon wiping out a camp of soldiers, the team discover a blonde woman chained up in one of their tents. She bites the finger off of one of the soldiers and then warns the team to “not go down.” The prisoner may be a civilian but the hardass team leader demands the termination of the woman. One of the soldiers begrudgingly follows the order. Enemy fire pins them down soon after, but after some killing and ignoring of war crimes, the team manage to make it to the extraction point and flee. Surviving the dangers of infiltrating a violent civil war, the unit is thrust into something worse when the group of soldiers return back to home base. A busted elevator forces them to take the stairs and they find themselves trapped on an endless stairwell where their past sins come to collect and a failure to move upward leads to death. Time stops working, reality crumbles and the soldiers start dropping as they march on to their final judgement under the realization that nothing makes any fucking sense anymore. That spooky prisoner they shot in the head seems to be the one haunting their elite asses and the connection is made pretty quickly to how they got placed in this awful situation… something their dickhead leader does not want to admit. With doorways leading back to their strike on the camp, they get it in their heads that if things play out differently, they may be able to escape their current predicament. Dwindling numbers in their ranks make it difficult but it sure beats wandering up a staircase forever. The cast is more than capable and the little-seen spirit design is fine if not a bit familiar but it runs way longer than it needs to and loses steam with way too much time left.

Zombies: The Beginning (2007) (Italy)

aka Zombie 2009/Island of the Living Dead 2 

⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

In May of 2007 the trash horror community lost a legend. Not as popular as Argento or as talented as Fulci, Bruno Mattei shuffled off this mortal coil without much fanfare. It's understandable, the man was lacking in many of the qualities respected filmmakers exhibit. He excelled at rush jobs and ripoffs. The majority of his career is filled with forehead-slapping failures and the kind of wonderful crap most low-budget movie makers wish they could harness. But Mattei kept at it and the trash gods blessed him with a gift. As a lover of garbage cinema, I can't say that I enjoy any purveyor of crap more than Bruno Mattei (or any Italian filmmaker). Mattei passed away nearly half way through the year of 2007 but he had one last gift to share and it's only fitting that his final film would be a cheap-ass ripoff of the Hollywood blockbuster Aliens. Picking up where 2006's Island of the Living Dead left off, lone survivor Sharon (Yvette Yzon and just forget about her being a red-eyed vampire and treasure hunter) is found floating on what remains of her blown up salvage ship. After a brief recovery in the hospital, she is forced to answer for the millions of dollars lost in the explosion of the ship and materials aboard by the Tyler INC company. Needless to say, her story about an island of flesh-eating zombies is not being bought by anyone. She gets shit-canned and becomes a monk, hoping she'll find some inner peace and escape from her constant nightmares of her time on that awful island. Well, Tyler INC has other plans. A big-wig from the company tracks her down, looking for her assistance. Apparently they checked up on her story, found it to be true and transported some of the living dead to a research facility on a different island. Now, they've lost contact with their team and could use the help of someone who has dealt with the undead before just in case shit has hit the fan. Hesitant at first, Sharon decides to confront her fears and join the rescue mission. Faster than you can say "copyright infringement" her, the Tyler INC company man and a team of soldiers are off to the island. If you've seen Aliens, you know where this is going. Just replace xenomorphs with some shoddy and lumpy zombies and you've hit the nail on the head. But you must remember, this is a Bruno Mattei film so you're not just getting a by-the-numbers rip off. Instead you get mutant children, chest-bursting babies, a giant mutant baby with an eyeball on its head, a possible Sasquatch cameo and (in the pièce de résistance) instead of an alien queen we get an English speaking papier-mâché giant brain. It almost seems purposeful just how bad the film is but if that were so, I'd enjoy it a hell of a lot less. It's the reason I've never really enjoyed Troma films. It's different when the creators actually set out to fail. Charmless actors, low-budget SFX, the shocking use of the Game of Thrones theme and dialogue written by a brain damaged monkey (when its not being outright stolen) all litter the run time. There is nothing wrong with loving the masters of their craft and Italy had a shit-ton of experts. On the fringes of Italian cinema that rascal Mattei built himself a little home made of garbage and I'd much rather spend time there than anywhere else. Ciao Bruno.

Island of the Living Dead (2007) (Italy)

aka Island of the Dead/Island of the Living Dead 2006/Bruno Mattei’s Island of the Living Dead

⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

Uncle Bruno speaks to my garbage-lovin’ heart once again but not only does he offer up cheapjack adventure involving zombies and the lovely Yvette Yzon. No. That’s not good enough for Mattei… not by a long shot. He also throws in vampires and ghosts to his Philippines-shot disaster stew. Did this man just refuse to hold back? Treasure hunters get themselves stranded on an island where the usual awfulness that happens when the soldiers of Catholicism decide the local population is comprised of heathens went down a long time ago. We watch as conquistadors repeat the classic opening to Fulci’s Zombie (unfortunately there’s no boat that can leave now) while voodoo practicing villagers do their mumbo jumbo. There’s plenty of dead people being blessed until too many rise and manage to take out the conquering Spaniards. Footage from another film shows a fiery end to their habitation. Present day introduces us to our ragtag group of treasure hunting heroes as they celebrate the discovery of a large treasure chest. Unfortunately, the bottom collapses and all the gold pours out into the sea. Bummer. Beers and remorse follow but they can’t lick their wounds for long because a fog bank comes out of nowhere and the boat is wrecked. The fog lifts and they discover that they’ve ended up very close to an island that shouldn’t exist. Instead of radioing for help, Captain Kirk (come on now) makes the choice to hold off on asking for help. As disturbing visions of Uwe Boll’s House of the Dead begin to poison my mind and confusion plagues me as to why Bruno Mattei (as hungry to rip-off anything as he was) decided that this was the movie he wanted to get his twisted hands on. I respect it but it still horrifies me. Anyways, one dope stays behind to work on the boat while the rest of the team wanders around the island, gazing upon destruction and cemeteries. A zombie conquistador who does not look Spanish at all (maybe he liked the silly hat) watches on and then turns to the camera and hisses. Of course two split off from the group to investigate the crumbling graveyard straight out of Zombie and get to do their own spin on the cemetery scene from Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. It’s a fucking buffet of zombie flicks handled by a chef who shouldn’t be allowed to serve food. So, my kind of video heaven. The zombie attacks much like in Night but this time a tubby Filipino in an all purpose jersey and sandals manages to come in and bring the king-fu butt whooping to the living dead that was so sorely needed in Romero’s classic. The other group stumbles across spooky old tomes in an underground cave/torture chamber that should not be read by anyone, ever. So… they read the Latin text out loud even though it’s been well established the dead are already walking and eating. The mechanic goes first (well, the tubby dude actually dies by sacrificing himself but you find that out a little later) and the ship explodes because he presses the boat’s self destruct button which I guess is something boats have. With a blown up boat and a stolen lifeboat, the captain makes the bold choice to find refuge before night falls. That’s why he’s the captain. Night falls and they’re still wandering around, which leaves them out in the open when a horde of flesh eaters attack. Bullets get them out of the jam but they’re all just a few moments away from the next nightmare scenario. More searching leads to Grim Reaper statues that move and the retrieval of books that will clue in the team as to what went down on the island. In has to do with a Spanish galleon, a bunch of gold and the Bermuda Triangle. Uncle Bruno, you spoil us! A scene “borrowed” from Mattei’s own Hell of the Living Dead introduces a zombie priest, questionable wine drinking introduces a Spanish ghost, a Snoopy shirt is worn by a man named Snoopy, an actual cask of Amontillado is discovered, chained zombies litter a torch-lit hall, a dancing female vampire appears straight from her large portrait (Snoopy dances with her), this scene also involves an oddly effective bit where undead hands play a lute (the rest of the corpse is covered in shadow), a treasure is discovered with a growling and eye-patched zombie head inside (it becomes a regular skull after they close the lid and reopen it), Snoopy lets the team know the island is cursed which the rest of the gang inexplicably don’t believe, the eye splinter scene from Zombie happens (without the disgusting payoff), heads explode, people die, a ghost explains shit, a cobweb-covered countess is upset over stolen jewelry but takes the time to talk to a crew member and lay out the reason why the island is full of so much supernatural bullshit (cue more footage from a different movie!), skeletal monks appear (well, monks in skeleton masks that would make Jess Franco grin) and an escape plan is hatched well after most of our heroes have perished. There’s so much thrown at the audience that it’s easy to forget you’re just watching idiots walk around a spooky place, running into different shit and dying. There’s a main evil behind everything (revealed right before the elderly ghost/zombie countess is engulfed in flames) and it’s a vampire/zombie priest so that checks. The movie is a poorly plotted mess but it’s a poorly plotted mess from one of my favorite trash auteurs so I loved every silly minute. Love you Uncle Bruno, miss you all the time.