The Wicker Man (2006) (USA/Mexico/Canada/Germany)

⭐️1/2

When a desperate mother pleads with shellshocked sheriff Nicolas Cage to find her missing daughter, unintentional hilarity ensues. Cage is off to the matriarchal island community where the little girl vanished and he slowly uncovers that there’s a larger scheme afoot. Not that it will do him any good. NOT THE BEES! This is not a good movie but you’re not here for a good movie. No. You’re here for Nic Cage in a bear costume, running around like a lunatic and punching a woman in the face. There’s some moments of idiotic splendor but there’s a lot of crap to sludge through and you may just want to watch a supercut of Mr. Cage flipping out instead of watching some notable celebrities embarrass themselves.

Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964) (Japan)

aka Godzilla vs. The Thing 

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Showa era classic is the last purely villainous role for the king of the monsters for a nice long while. It also features the excellent MosuGoji suit which remains a favorite amongst G-fans. A giant egg washes ashore following a violent typhoon. A greedy developer manages to claim ownership and decides to build an amusement park around the mysterious egg and set it up as the park’s main attraction. Of course the egg is from Infant Island and mama Mothra wants her incubating babies back. Being a peaceful giant monster, she attempts to have two fairy twins ask politely and warn that once the babies hatch they may not be malevolent but they sure as hell will be hungry and won’t know any better than to destroy everything in their path. The greedy businessman looks to continue his reaping ways by trying to kidnap the twins. They escape and luckily come across a reporter, his spunky photographer and a zoologist who are far more sympathetic to their cause. Heartless corporations and concerned scientists may be of little concern to the immediate future because guess what atomic-breathed beast has reappeared and is making his way to Japan. This sets up some awesome monster on monster fighting, magical singing and a whole lot of destruction. The costumes are beautiful and the human drama actually progresses the story in one of the best of the entire Godzilla series.

D-Railed (2018) (USA)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The fresh smell of stupidity is in the air and the only reason I'm not excusing myself from the room is because that familiar stank was not released on purpose. Nothing makes me give up on a film quicker than a purposefully bad output. It always just seems like the filmmakers are saying "we know this sucks... but that's exactly what we wanted!" Yeah. Ok. Go fuck yourself. Trying and failing can lead to a charmingly good time, trying to fail just pisses me off. What I love about D-Railed is you can almost sense a vibe of superiority in its veins and that just makes its crappiness all the more enjoyable. A refurbished train from the early 1900s is set up for a Halloween night murder mystery. A handful of costumed guests climb aboard and look forward to the dinner theater fun. There's Evelyn, who seems to be a little off and is only there because her friend in the cast got her a ticket. She also hallucinates sometimes... I'm sure we'll find out why! Then there's Abigail, a young girl whose rich parents couldn't make it so they sent her with her nanny (?) Antonia. Antonia doesn't want to be there and not because she shares the mindset of many people invited to a dinner theater production but because she's getting some bad vibes from the train. Eugene is a cosmetics salesman and a murder mystery production addict. He's probably the most likable person in this flick. There's rude and boorish Mr. Jessup whose main character trait is "obvious piece of shit". Finally we have Thomas, who looks like a budget store Will Forte and claims to be at the show because his dead brother wanted him to go. That may be one of the lamest last requests I have ever heard and now I plan on forcing it upon anyone who outlives me. There's a few actors who will be around for a bit and even other audience members but you really don't need to worry about familiarity. After a quick speech about secrets from the host of the damn thing, the first unsettling tremors of a possible supernatural subplot begin to sneak in. At this point you'll probably be able to predict how the whole thing is going to end. Which is fine, because everything leading up to that is like watching your favorite literature professor accidentally take angel dust and complete the Agatha-Christie-ish novel they've been working on for a decade. The lights flicker and the body drops dead with a knife in his back. There's a mystery to be solved and the cast is going to need the audience's help. Or they would if the whole thing were allowed to play out. It turns out Mr. Jessup and Thomas are in cahoots with one of the actresses (she goes by the name Gigi) and plan on robbing all these schmucks. Thomas immediately has regrets when he sees how violent Jessup and Gigi are but he gets a gun pulled on him and has to go along. Mr. Jessup goes to tell the coal-shoveling operators to stop the train but instead he gets a shovel to the throat. Unfortunately he manages to shoot and kill the men operating the train. Worse yet, the train is heading full speed to a dangerous turn. With no one to pull the breaks, the train flys off the rails and into a lake. A handful of folks survive but the boxcar is slowly sinking. With the water rising, folks begin to panic. That panic turns into terror when it's discovered some rubber-suited man-fish creature is dwelling in the pool... ahem... I mean lake and seems to have a taste for human flesh. It picks off the rest of the expendable cast and leaves a small group alive. This small group manages to make it to a nearby piece of land. They discover the world's largest rundown cabin (it seems to be a warehouse) and go exploring. Fishman shows up and picks 'em off one by one. There's still a final revelation which is more so an affirmation of what you knew was coming about ten minutes into the movie. But Lance Henriksen is there to fill you in on the back story, so I'm not complaining. Glorious stupidity would be my best two word summation of D-Railed. The dialogue slips from noire cheese to overdramatic in the blink of an eye. The acting is suitably dinner theater quality and there are some of the least impressive digital effects I've ever seen captured before the viewer's eye. But it's never giving you a wink and a nudge. It's like a toddler proudly displaying the shit smeared artwork they left on the wall. It just seems that nobody knew any better. I can get behind that. The rubber monster suit is fun but woefully underutilized and there's some minor bits of graphic violence. The art may be fecal matter on a stucco wall but I'll be damned if I'm not just a little bit proud of it.

Flesh Eaters from Outer Space (1989) (USA)

aka A Taste for Flesh and Blood 

⭐️⭐️1/2

A flesh eating (obviously) alien frees itself from a military prison and faces some seriously tough luck by ending up in New Jersey. Sure, there’s plenty of dumbasses to feast upon but there’s also some northeastern non-actors ready to get drunk and fuck. Big vision and no money brings the outer space footage to life in a gloriously mundane fashion and exposition gets delivered via someone’s grandpa in a lab coat talking into a phone. It says something to the budget that even they could not afford John Carradine to do what he does best. The big-eyed monster suit looks like something John Agar would have gone up against in the sixties and yes, that is praise. Cheap splatter is in abundance as the monster rambles around and eats anyone unfortunate enough to cross its path… after ripping out their guts and lopping off their limbs, of course. A blonde psychic has visions of the murders and wakes up gasping in her bed. An astronaut is decked out with special weapons and sent after the creature but it’s off the books. He and reluctant psychic Sandra are going to need to work together to stop the terror but there’s gonna be a shit-ton of boredom and jabbering before that can happen. Imagine a 50’s monster flick with seizure-inducing quick cuts of messy splatter, poorly conceived and delivered melodrama and way more New Jersey than anyone should ever be forced to experience. If you can manage to sink yourself into the dull Jersey skin of the large-haired and largely unappealing parade of tragic humanity, you will manage to get some sick thrills from the non-thrilling endeavor. Like people-watching with that friend who is just as sardonic as you, ya just gotta be comfortable with how much free time you’re wasting. There’s some shocking full frontal nudity (not that it’s explicit just that there’s no way anybody behind this should have been able to convince any female to get naked), some low quality music acts, a lull in monster action that feels like it goes on for at least three years, a homosexual serial killer that shows up out of nowhere (who gets mistaken for John Belushi) and vanishes back there, questionable hair, queasy mustaches, pasty white asses, a completely bleak last act and a drunk dude getting his penis ripped off. I don’t think John Agar or Carradine ever had to deal with such things.

B.C. Butcher (2016) (USA)

⭐️1/2

Cavewomen and slashers, a match made in heaven. It’s one million B.C. and Kadeem Haridison is narrating that the B.C. Butcher is terrorizing the area. We then get a title song about it. So it’s all covered for us now. Dina, one of the cavewomen, is facing harsh punishment for going after the tribe leaders two-timing mate Rex. Dina is pregnant with Rex’s child and after sharing that, she is eviscerated and cannibalized by the valley girl cavewomen. A legendary disfigured caveman discovers the corpse of Dina and falls in love with it. So homicidal revenge is now on the brute’s primitive brain after she visits him in his dreams and tells him to avenge her. A blind Jamaican prophetess predicts doom but is ignored by the tribe. It’s a stupid movie that knows it’s stupid and it would work if it was actually funny. Instead it feels like anything else Lloyd Kaufman got his grubby producer hands on and spoiled any entertainment that should have come from it. I mean, the best thing about it is the performance from Kato Kaelin… yes… Kato Kaelin is actually pretty damn funny in this. The monster mask is perfect in how cheap it is and the girls are easy on the eyes but this style of knowing idiocy just ain’t my scene. Fortunately, it only runs 51 minutes. Unfortunately, that’s still too long.

Aquaslash (2019) (Canada)

⭐️⭐️

Insufferable graduates hold an annual celebration party at Wet Valley Water Park where, unbeknownst to them, a lunatic has set up a giant razor blade death trap in a waterslide. Back in the summer of ‘84 the park was the site of a murder and the place hasn’t been the same since. There’s also some tension amongst the staff of the park and the usual high school bullshit that comes along with different cliques being mixed together. Unfortunately, that and uninteresting partying is what makes up the bulk of the movie. It’s a bold and very stupid choice for a slasher flick. If you’re into slasher films strictly for the sex, drugs and asshole people then first off; what the hell is wrong with you? Just go watch those nearly unwatchable comedies from the same decade and secondly; this movie is for you. There’s even drama about the sale of the waterpark to further add to the “Who really gives a fuck about any of that?” vibes. After what feels like forever, following the perfectly done murder of two banging employees in the pre-credits, the razor blade trap is finally put to use and it’s a wonderful set piece… until it loses its punch by repeating itself. Add a particular awful cover of Sunglasses at Night to further ruin the mood. So again, if your main complaint about slasher films is that there is way too much slashing, then you should watch this ASAP. Everyone else can be just as angry as me that this wonderful title was not used for another movie. The climactic bloodbath works, it just really could have used more slasher shit in the buildup to make it worth your while.

Dragon Wasps (2012) (USA)

aka Terror Tropical 

⭐️⭐️

Deep in the Belizean jungle, Dr Humphries and her likable partner (Nikolette Noel) search for her missing papa with the assistance of the U.S. Army (lead by a jungle-loving Corin Nemec). They survive a skirmish with the local guerrillas but eventually partner up when they come under attack from a horde of freakishly large wasps. Of course, there’s some genetic experimentation going on from some shady American company and they’ve created one hell of an amalgam of horror. They eventually hunt down the hive to save whatever snatched-up survivors they can find and bring an end to the fire-breathing and shoddy cgi monsters. As much as I love me some Nemec (and he is fun here) the flick still feels pretty lethargic. There are some body-bursting wasps but it’s all kind of run-of-the-mill and could have used a nice boost of wasp-repelling cocaine to bring it somewhere above average.