Zapatlela (1993) (India)

⭐️⭐️⭐️

There's something so damn beautiful about a rip-off handled through the hands of another culture. Although, I would say "rip-off" may be too strong of a term. You see, this Indian flick has the lifeblood of Child's Play running through its veins but somewhere a blood transfusion was necessary and it just mutated into its own damn thing. Luckily there's enough plagiarism at work to make this un-subtitled two-hour trek a little bit recognizable. Sadly I'm not sure just how much love they were expressing in the various musical bits, but I'm just gonna assume it was a buttload. A goofy-ass looking mobster and his goofy-ass looking hunchbacked sidekick pay a visit to a black arts practicing tantrik. It would seem the crime boss, Vinchu, wants to learn a mantra which will allow him to transfer his soul from body to body, thus enabling him to live on forever. I know... this all sounds very familiar. The tantrik, Baba, is easily bullied and teaches him the words he must say to accomplish his goal of immortality. It turns out Vinchu is lucky to have learned what he did because soon after his meeting with Baba, a badass inspector leads a charge on his warehouse where he gets into whatever it is creepy crime bosses get into. He and his hunchbacked pal flee. They don't get far. Inspector badass manages to beat the crap out of old hunchback and he gets a few well placed shots at Vinchu. Realizing the end is near, Vinchu grabs the closest thing to him and performs the mantra. The closest thing to him is a large dole that is somehow concurrently the goofiest thing to ever grace the screen and a throughly disturbing visualization of nightmare fuel. So we've pretty much been in pure Child's Play territory for the opening, what with the story being the exact same thing and everyone looking like an off brand version of their inspiration, but that's all about to change. Instead of a desperate momma looking for her son's dream present we have a desperate ventriloquist looking like he hasn't missed a meal. Cheap-o Chucky gets in the shrill-voiced buffoon’s hands and immediately let's him in on his secret. Seeing an easy source of money, our hero is excited at first for his new horrific buddy but soon comes to learn that this dummy ain't no saint. There's a murder committed by the maniacal muppet and the ventriloquist, Lakshya, is blamed. Admittedly, there would be something wrong with you if you believed a grown man's claims that his new doll was running around, getting into trouble. So everyone pretty much assumes Lakshya has lost his god damn mind which makes it a little easier for Vinchu to attempt to transfer his soul into India's answer to Jeff Dunham. This being a flick from India there is a shit-ton more going on than just the adventures of a walking dummy. Inspector badass is also around, falling in love with his chief's daughter. Lakshya has a girlfriend who he's getting into goofy shit with and his long suffering sister (mother?) is putting up with almost too much. And in the background the whole time is a delightfully cheap looking doll (brought to life by less than special effects) running around and shouting dialogue in an echoey voice. Inspector badass with the cool kung fu moves eventually comes around to believing his thought-to-be-dead enemy is inhabiting the body of the doll. This brings them back to Baba for help and it all leads to a climactic rooftop battle between two men and the ugly-ass doll. You'll need more patience than usual when it comes to this one. The comedy is persistent and more annoying than anything. There's a good amount of musical bits which you'll either see as an interruption or a blessing (I've always loved 'em). I surely felt the slog but I was so damn in love with the bat-shit insanity of a low-rent Chucky that the boredom was easily forgiven.

YellowBrickRoad (2010) (USA)

aka Vanished

⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

The entire population of Friar, New Hampshire took to a mountain trail and journeyed into the wilderness one day in 1940. Some were found dead but most just vanished forever and the lone survivor was left a rambling mess. Decades later, an expedition is setting out on the infamous trail to figure out just what the hell happened. Headed by a husband and wife team of authors and their professor/behavioral psychologist friend, they take a small team with them into the mysterious area of New England. Arriving in the town they find no luck in tracking down the trail head until a townie offers to help them, as long as she can come along. The group soon comes to realize that the unsettling history is far beyond their realm of comprehension and a horrific mix of madness and violence is in their near future. Is it a group hallucination? A malevolent force? Some strange dimensional time loop? You’re never going to find out but that’s fine by me. It’s a hell of a ride and the ending is suitably vague and true to what has come before. Disorienting, slightly disturbing and completely refreshing, YellowBrickRoad is a lovely piece of nightmare cinema.

Xibalba (2017) (Mexico)

aka Curse of the Mayans

⭐️⭐️⭐️

After a portion of the Mayan codices is discovered during construction beneath a convent, American archaeologist Dr. Alan Green enlists the aid of Danielle Noble and her team of expert cave divers to help him explore underground and discover a long-lost location of ancient Mayan records. Instead of a library of forgotten history, the group discovers trouble in the underwater caves of Xibalba. Ms. Noble has a tragedy in her past which has made her swear off underwater exploration but a gigantic payday for she and her team has her going against her better judgement. The initial excitement of their discovery turns to terror when bizarre shit starts happening and the revelation of the actual horror the Mayans faced comes to the forefront… reptilian-aliens/demons, of course. Alien tech and human possession all come into play. Surprisingly likable characters and beautiful location filming bring this one far above the low expectations coming in. Quick flashes of toothy monsters work to help you ignore some silliness and dragging but all in all it’s a blast with an ending that relies a bit too much on exposition and is laughably ridiculous.

Wreckage (2010) (USA)

aka Twisted

⭐️⭐️

Wesley Jones escapes from prison 15 years after gunning down his drug-addict mother and her abusive boyfriend. His younger brother actually did it but that’s kind of a spoiler to just point out right here at the beginning of the review. Oh well. While this is going on, a young woman is being pursued by a rapist with a big knife. She flees into a scrapyard and just as her would-be-assaulter finds her, somebody bashes his head in. Hit them credits! Wow. These credits are still going. Nope. They just don’t stop. Hey! Alright. Here’s the movie. Inept cops talk about the escaped killer and a newly engaged couple work on a car (there’s a dipstick proposal) and are visited by another couple (hey, it’s Aaron Paul!). Mr. Fiancé (Jared, if you’re at all interested) races some douche in a sports car and his car dies when he blows a gasket. They’re stranded without any phone reception so they decide to wander over to a nearby junkyard and get what they need to fix the car. Aaron Paul’s girlfriend is pregnant and kinda sucks but Aaron Paul is also pretty awful at being a human so good for them… they’ll be horrible parents. Aaron Paul starts firing his gun because he sucks and a ricochet hits the newly engaged Kate. Jared heads off to make the four mile trek into town and get his lady some help. He has flashbacks to the proposal while he runs… it’s hilarious. He makes it to the cops and he and the sheriff head off to the junkyard with an EMT who may have once been a porn star, a doctor who I know I’ve seen in other things and a deputy who was definitely not a porn star but does have a creepy mustache. They find nobody when they arrive. They search the grounds and the strung up corpse of the pregnant woman tips them off that something bad is going on. They search on and after a dog attack, the cops and Jared find an injured Aaron Paul. He lets them know some dude attacked them out of nowhere and grabbed Kate. At this point Scoot fuckin’ McNairy shows up as the owner’s bumpkin nephew, responding to an alarm at the junkyard. If you like lazy hick “comedy” performed by an actor who is way better than this shit deserves, you should strap on in because you’ll be in heaven. A dude in a welding mask starts picking off everyone. They lose a couple folks but Aaron Paul and Kate get found and sent to the hospital. The escaped prisoner brings Kate to the siren noise after discovering her on the side of the road. He gives some bullshit story about just passing through town and ends up stabbed to death with his own knife when he runs and gets caught by Jared. They think it’s all wrapped up but we know better than that. It’s the lame slasher hijinks the release date would have you expect but the cast is better than it should be and it feels like the team behind it had a better idea of how to handle a budget.

Visher (2024) (USA)

⭐️⭐️⭐️

An online scammer gains access to a target’s webcam after growing a bit of an obsession with her when she opens up and personalizes herself to him. As he creepily embeds himself as a silent witness to her life, utilizing every camera hooked up to her computer, he begins to notice something unsettling is going on in her home… and not just the fact that he’s mentally disturbed and stalking this poor woman. They converse and Ruth lets on that she thinks her home is haunted, even emailing this stranger on the phone some terrifying video proof. Wrapped up in the intrigue, he lets her know that he has access to her cameras and has even seen something strange himself. From there, things swiftly spiral into nightmare territory and the likelihood of anything close to a happy ending for either person drops to near zero. It’s a two-person show for the most part and luckily for us director/writer Isaac Rodriguez (Last Radio Call and Deadware) has found two people who are good at their jobs. Rahul Chakraborty is excellent as the troubled conman, juggling a role that’s sad, pathetic and disturbing with ease. On the other end of the leash, Mandy Lee Rubio is solid as the woman who is wrapped up in more than one bit of awfulness through no fault of her own and brings the perfect level of sympathy and likability to someone who may be a little too trusting but still doesn’t come off as a fool. It will make sense of some plot holes by the time the credits hit. It loses steam as it winds down and gets a little too silly for its own good but the trip getting there works pretty damn well and it may not be the climax we wanted, but it’s the climax we deserve.

The Unkind (2021) (UK)

⭐️1/2

Six idiots partake in an Italian vacation, bunking down in a beautiful Italian villa one of them inherited. Of course the place has a bad history and of course the annoying dinks stir up some awfulness. Things start off with bisexual psychic Ashley having some strange visions and then their car gets fucked up and their phones have no signal. Surrounded by miles of forest, the wieners realize they’re pretty much stuck at the villa. While looking around the cavernous cellar for canned food, two of the dips go off to have sex. After a jump-scare ruins the anti-erotic bang session, the dude wanders away and finds a creepy-ass room filled with unsettling sketches and antiques. He also finds an altar where an ancient-lookin’ book is sinisterly displayed. Someday morons will learn to leave old-ass books alone, today is not that day. It’s a diary and it shares the story of the evil possession that went down at the location which ended in the death of a family and the slaying of a loved one. The disfigured witch is buried on the property (I mean, the place does have a crypt) and said book leads the group to her grave. Since folks don’t take supernatural things seriously, the murder-happy woman comes back and messy ends start hitting our heroes like any late 80s spaghetti nightmare. Awkward dubbing and dialogue will have you smiling as visions of Eurociné dance through your head. The dull opening stretch may try your patience but once the silly-lookin’ hell-bitch starts doing what she does best, things get a little better, but not much. Giggling ghost kids run around, security camera footage feels incredibly out of place, there’s a mannequin room, everyone acts like an idiot in between unconvincingly acting like a human and anytime action fires up, the “drama” takes you right out of it. More lame than anything, even if it did give off some vibes that were right up my alley.

Thunder of Gigantic Serpent (1988) (Hong Kong)

aka Terror Serpent

⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

One of those pesky secret formulas/mechanisms that causes things to grow to ridiculous sizes ends up in the hands of a little girl and she accidentally zaps her pet snake (and best friend) with whatever the formula/mechanism is because how else are you gonna explain a monster snake causing a ruckus. The terrorists responsible for stealing and losing the formula set their sights on the girl but her colossal reptilian protector has other plans. The head of the evil organization knows if he has control of the formula, he will have control of the world’s food supply and that will give him power. He expresses this much in the opening. What follows is bullshit…glorious bullshit. Godfrey Ho does what he does best and massacres a Taiwanese film by the name of King of the Serpents to unleash trash bliss. The opening credits are set to music that sounds like you’re rushing through a level of Contra after ingesting all of your brother’s cocaine (you thought it was sugar). The head of the terrorist organization gives a performance that will go down in history as so bad it transcends talent and becomes mythical. The young girl communicates with her huge reptile which nods and shakes its head and sometimes shrieks and keeps it in the family shed because there’s no way her mother would approve. A dull-as-dirt American special agent badass (Ted Fast) shows up to help the scientists and military who lost the formula. An inspector is also looking into things and forms a relationship with a lab worker who was a reluctant agent for the terrorist organization. All of this loosely comes together with scenes of the age-old kinship between girl and snake. The snake gets even larger after a trap set by the villains goes wrong and things get even dumber. There’s also massive collateral damage presented on a budget. Good times but as it goes with most of these Ho-downs, it somewhat overstays its welcome.

Savage Harvest (1994) (USA)

⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

A group of young folks head out to the family property of one of the girls to help her relative clean out an old barn. Sometime in the 1830’s, after escaping with some of his tribe from the Trail of Tears, a Cherokee elder started messing around with dark magic and summoned a devil. Now the land is cursed and wouldn’t ya know it; the demon made up of the souls of evil people has been unleashed. Possession and splatter follows. The youngsters find themselves unable to leave and relying on Uncle Gary’s notes on the native people’s legends to outlast the slowly growing number of violent monsters they once called their friends. Impressive low-budget horror from Eric Stanze doesn’t bend the knee to its limitations and shows just what the hell a whole lotta initiative can pull off. It’s by no means perfect but it’s still a tight bit of backyard creativity.

Radioactive Cannibal Vikings from Hell (2007) (Sweden)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Four homicidal criminals decide to lay low after they murder a roadside sausage saleswoman. A dirt road layered with nails forces them to stop in what looks to be a one-home village. Said village served as a dumping ground for nuclear waste and the inhabitants have been transformed into hard-to-kill mutant Viking cannibals. Two of the gang get captured by the plastic-helmet-wearing creeps and tough as nails leader, Trash, doesn’t plan on leaving her soldiers to a horrible death. Zero-budget stupidity features a man-eating elk, a machine gun named Daddy Killcount, lovely special effects and the last minute appearance of an ancient Viking zombie. It runs just under thirty minutes so it never overstays its welcome.

Queen of Spades (2021) (Canada)

⭐️1/2

Bloody-Mary-adjacent boogeywoman, the Queen of Spades, can supposedly be summoned after performing a ritual. It involves a queen of spades playing card, a candle, drawing a door and a staircase on a mirror and then following that up with saying the name a few times in your standard well-lit darkness. Conjuring up the creepy creeper will have her granting you a wish if she is at peace but if she’s not… well, you’re just fucked. Four teenage idiots do just that and unleash the ancient evil on themselves and their loved ones. They learn the name after witnessing some kid jump off the roof of a community center they’re hanging around, it being the last words they hear from him before they flee to avoid the police they called. One gets interested in what the dude said and looks into the Russian legend of the kid-killing woman who ended up facing mob justice and horrible torture. Seeing YouTube views in their future, they get going with the spooky shenanigans. Oh man, they’re so fucked. Our lead is a mopey thirteen-year-old dope by the name of Anna who treats her hard-working mother like shit (I know that’s just what teenagers do… still doesn’t make you want to root for ‘em) and just kinda sucks at life. The jokester of the group gets marked first with an open sore on his arm and comes to Anna for help. She brushes him off, thinking he’s being an ass (a normal human would see the kid’s anxiety as very real) and acts all surprised when he collapses from a heart attack after doing weird shit in front of the mirror. This girl is wet dog shit on a white couch. The smart kid (he has glasses) reaches out to the author of a book he read on the subject and is told they’re pretty much boned and they should make their peace. Anna’s mom thinks the surviving kids are messing with her daughter but she also has to work so she lets them off with a warning about ending all the foolishness. The creepy lady begins showing up in reflective surfaces kinda looking like the spooky lady from the Insidious films who ended up being a serial killer in drag… I think… I watch a lot of movies. Mom eventually gets creeped out, realizes shit has gotten weird and actually takes a day off to help her daughter out of this paranormal predicament she’s gotten herself in. Everyone seems to be heavily sedated and pissed-off at each other and even when things should be picking up, it never transitions out of first gear and just keeps chugging along. There’s a walkie-talkie scene that works a bit and creepy-ghost-lady™ may be lazy but them bitches be somewhat effective anyways. I don’t know, take a nap instead.

Planet of the Sharks (2016) (USA)

⭐️1/2

In the near future, global warming has caused extensive flooding and the planet earth is now 98% covered in water. The apex predator of the sea is now the dominant species on this liquid wasteland and the remaining human race is forced to fight for their lives on floating towns. On top of raising temperatures and a dwindling water supply, a mutated alpha shark has become leader of all sharkdom and a small group of scientists are the only thing that offer any sign of hope for humanity’s future. A lone survivor of the recently shark-destroyed Junk City is rescued by a rugged ship captain named Barrick who operates alongside the research facility Vestron Station working recovery and salvage to help them build some planet-saving CO2 scrubbing missile. The somewhat creole ruler (and best character) of the main city Salvation, prides herself in shark killin’ and doesn’t take the possible threat of a shark army seriously. It doesn’t end well for her and her clan of extreme fishermen. There’s a lot of talk between minimal shark attacks brought to life by laughable cgi and folks standing around looking pretty concerned as cast members get eaten. Not so much Deep Blue Sea but way more like Waterworld with 10% of the action, 5% of the talent and 1% of the budget. It’s more boring than bad but Angie Teodora Dick is wonderful for the brief time we get to spend with her as the displaced Louisianan and they get some points for their ambitions and the charmingly dumb climax that unfortunately just keeps going.

Offerings (1989) (USA)

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Oklahoma-shot slasher borrows heavily from John Carpenter’s Halloween and fails miserably. Luckily because of that failure, it comes off like a Bizarro World version of the ‘78 classic and works for the trash-film-loving crowd. Young Johnny has a shitty home life and finds some respite in the company of a kindhearted neighborhood girl named Gretchen. Dickhole kids being dickholes leads to an accidental tumble down a well for the quiet and already-displaying-signs-of-a-psychopath Johnny. Never the same after the fall, Johnny is eventually placed into a sanitarium following the murder and partial eating of his mother. Ten years after that, Johnny escapes and heads back home. He begins picking off the former dickhole kids (now jerkoff young adults) and leaving various body parts for Gretchen as tokens of appreciation. The only hope Gretchen has is placed in the protection of the neighborhood’s overweight sheriff (yay!). The basic plot gives you some morsels of similarities but there’s enough there to tell yourself it’s kind of trudging its own path. Denial can only get you so far and there’s so much shit going on just outside of that narrative trail it becomes hilarious. The disturbance of a family member’s grave, John’s psychiatrist joining the hunt, the eating of live animals, and the climatic shooting of the hulking killer all make their way into the film just shot with far less talent. The dug up grave scene finds the cemetery caretaker an overacting and mugging weirdo, playing the scene for laughs. John’s psychiatrist is no Dr. Loomis (in any form he’s ever taken) and becomes an afterthought as the husky sheriff takes over the role of hero (something I’m very thankful for). There’s no discarded dog carcass discovered as the killer’s meal, instead it’s a few ducks by a pleasant pond. And that climatic shooting is a slow motion mess with one of the least threatening hulking killers I’ve ever seen. They also throw in some variations on Carpenter’s now legendary score and briefly mention Gretchen having some psychic powers. Sure. Why the hell not? Fat law officers and pizza with human toppings aside, Offerings is in no way a good movie. Even if it wasn’t a jumbling of a far superior film and stood on its own merits, it would still be called crap. But somehow, it works.