MY CALL:  Anyone seeking a worthy follow-up to Pumpkinhead will surely be disappointed.  But adventures in search of a worthy B-movie or a silly scary movie date night will find an entertaining evening.   MORE MOVIES LIKE Pumpkinhead II: Blood Wings:  Pumpkinhead (1988), of course, is FAR superior.  Maybe even try the later sequels (2006 and 2007)—I haven’t seen them but they couldn’t possibly measure up to the original.  But this sequel harkens to the quality of Leprechaun 2 (1994), Leprechaun 3 (1995), Leprechaun in Space (1996), Wishmaster 2 (1999) and Wishmaster 3 (2001).

Some people dread the sequels of their favorite classic horror movies, often picked up by different and less experienced writers and directors and remanded to direct-to-video/DVD.  Not me.  Even when they never measure up, I’m happy someone tried.

Director Jeff Burr (Puppet Master 4-5, Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III) takes the helm and follows in the footsteps of makeup special effects wizard turned one-time horror director Stan Winston (Pumpkinhead).  Those are some big shoes to fill.

The opening scene is far from promising.  It’s a shining example of how the video era made the 90s a terrible decade for horror.  Anyone could make a film in the 90s (and today…but not in the 80s).  They couldn’t necessarily act, write, direct or edit.  But they could film whatever drivel that wandered in front of the camera.  In this sequel the acting is bottom tier, the characters aren’t at all likable, and the dialogue is 80% lame exposition; just awful.

We flash back to 1958, when a disfigured boy is tortured and killed by a clique of malicious greasers as his elderly mother watched.  Then we shift to present day and find the modern counterparts of those young criminals.  These delinquents waste no time smoking pot, drinking underage, and making unwanted sexual advances.  Pumpkinhead (1988) was heavily troped up, but at least I could enjoy the characters.  This is just crass.

Even at a glance the 1988 victims (above) look way more credible than the bright-eyed bushy-tailed “delinquents” in 1993 (below).

A big city cop (Andrew Robinson; Hellraiser, Trancers 3, Child’s Play 3) moves his family to the woods to become a small town sheriff.  His daughter Jenny (Ami Dolenz; Ticks, Witchboard 2) falls into the wrong crowd almost instantly.

While out late and up to no good they hit the local witch (Lilyan Chauvin; Predator 2, Silent Night, Deadly Night) with their car and stumble across her cabin.  In her primitive and filthy home they find a ritual, a spell from the Book of Shadows to raise the dead.  But the vehicular assault clearly wasn’t enough, so a teenager (J. Trevor Edmond; Lord of Illusions, Return of the Living Dead 3) beats her, steals a magical totem and leaves her to die as her cabin burns down with her in it.  So naturally, the witch curses them that the demonic entity Pumpkinhead will exact her revenge.

But what’s strange is that, after being cursed, the kids go dig up her dead son (somehow knowing exactly where to dig), desecrate his grave, and perform the dead-awakening ritual themselves!  Soooooo… did the curse even matter?  Well, like I said, it’s not competently written.

Well now somehow all the locals know that “it’s back” and “it won’t stop until it gets what it wants.”  Evidently the local folklore is more like common knowledge.

SIDEBAR with SPOILERS: The Nature of the Curse, Part 1 vs Part 2.  Another unfortunate shortcoming is that this sequel completely ignores the rules of the curse as they were laid out in Pumpkinhead.  In Pumpkinhead Ed has the witch invoke the ritual to summon Pumpkinhead, a demonic spirit of vengeance.  In doing so, he tied his own fate to that of the demon such that when Pumpkinhead was injured, he would suffer the same injury, and when Pumpkinhead was killed, he also would die.  But it wasn’t so simple.  Ed not only died with Pumpkinhead, but Ed “became” the placeholder for the next Pumpkinhead summoning and as the demon came closer to completing Ed’s revenge, Ed took on some aspects of the demon (e.g., his whitening eyes).  Ed’s body was buried in the pumpkin patch, disfigured as the neo-natal, pre-summoned Pumpkinhead before him.

This sequel now identifies that Pumpkinhead was Tommy’s father.  Well, Tommy died in 1958 when he and Ed were both children.  So when Ed (in his childhood flashback in Pumpkinhead) saw the demon, did he see Tommy’s father as Pumpkinhead?  Even if so, Ed replaced the former Pumpkinhead.  So it should instead be Ed who is this iteration of Pumpkinhead.  Moreover, the second Pumpkinhead was formed from Tommy’s body (not his father’s) in his own grave site (not the pumpkin patch).  And this new Pumpkinhead was summoned by the witch, who dies while Pumpkinhead continues to exact his revenge—so there goes the bound fate idea.  Shame…it was a great idea in Pumpkinhead.
I can’t explain why they’d break that continuity.  Was it really so much easier to do it this way instead, thus throwing out such excellent folklore?  Of course, the binding fate conferred a sense of human frailty and realized morality.  Even though Ed Harley summoned the beast and tied their fates, he stopped the demon despite it meaning his own end.  There is no such grace to be found in this sequel.

So we eventually learned that this Pumpkinhead is actually Tommy!  Not his father.  And at the end of the movie Pumpkinhead has no implied successor—certainly not the dead witch.  Only a lame finale.  So the once-harrowing cursed sense of legacy is also squandered.  Yet further perplexing is that Ed Harley’s father was Tom in Pumpkinhead, but Tom had a ten year old Ed back in 1958.  So there’s no dispute that this Tom is not Tommy-Pumpkinhead nor is there any link between them.  I wonder if the writer and director even saw Pumpkinhead!

To call the special effects inferior to Stan Winston’s glorious original wouldn’t be unwarranted.  This rubber monster is certainly more than passable.  The long fingers lack some of the refinement of Winston’s Pumpkinhead, which also had a perpetual mucousy sheen and a more expressive face that conferred greater personality.

1988 above, 1993 below

There’s some blood and dismemberment, but most of the flesh-rending action takes place off-screen.  The important thing is that we really get to see the monster—it’s entire body—and not just his head in some shots and a swinging claw in others.  We see it and we see a lot of it!  And if I had never seen part 1 for comparison, I’d be pleased with this creature feature’s Pumpkinhead.  One deficit, though, would be this monster’s feet.  They lack the spindly xenomorphic look of 1988.  No, this 1993 model is a bit more lumbering T-rex than velociraptor.

Hulking 1993 demon above, spindly 1988 demon below.

When it came to the witch, this sequel was barely even phoning it in.  The 1988 witch was shrouded in menace and primitive mysticism.  When she spoke your ears listened and your stomach tightened.  She exuded that backwoods black magic atmosphere.  This which was a lumpy latex-faced menace with no lines of substance and a cheaply over-staged cabin lair.  But that would fit most comparisons to be made between 1993 and 1988.  Woefully ill-written, less expertly effected, and unthoughtfully over-staged.  Don’t even get me started comparing Lance Henriksen (Harbinger Down, Aliens, AVP, The Pit and the Pendulum) to Andrew Robinson; it wouldn’t be fair, especially with the hand Robinson (who was once great in Hellraiser) was dealt in terms of the script and director.

The “okay” 1993 witch above; the harrowing 1988 witch below.

This sequel feels more campy.  Kane Hodder (Smothered, Wishmaster, Hatchet, Love in the Time of Monsters) and Linnea Quigley (Night of the Demons, Silent Night, Deadly Night, Creepazoids) have cameos—really just an excuse to throw in some boobs and fan favorite actors.  At one point Pumpkinhead picks up a victim and executes a WWF backbreaker—at which point any minimal semblance of creepy atmosphere the film had, is lost.  A broken spine is devastating and all, but it didn’t seem like the style of a demon, nor did the “death by pecking chickens” scene.

And therein lies this movie’s greatest shortcoming: completely uninventive death scenes.  It’s awesome seeing Pumpkinhead, but almost boring watching him kill (largely off-screen).  That is, of course, outside of the so-bad-it’s-good chuckle here or there.  With the exception of one sloppy campy decapitation, there is no gore worth mentioning.  And, by the way, there are no “wings” in Blood Wings despite some suggestive movie posters.  It’s just a really stupid play on a really stupid plot point.

See the “blood wings” on the wall?  Yeah.  That’s our title.  SMH.

Anyone seeking a worthy follow-up to Pumpkinhead will surely be disappointed…very disappointed.  But adventures in search of a worthy B-movie or a silly scary movie date night will find an entertaining evening.

MY CALL:  People often discuss this epic film for its nudity (and not much else) and I consider that a shame.  It’s excellent, features strong acting and an elaborate story, and including great concepts and special effects.  I’d recommend it to all horror fans, new and old, critical and horror-hound alike.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Lifeforce:  For life-draining horror films featuring excellent effects and interesting stories, I’d highly recommend Hellraiser (1987) and Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988).

Director Tobe Hooper (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre II, Poltergeist, Funhouse) is a horror master!  Many know of Steven Spielberg’s heavy-handed involvement in Poltergeist and thus question Hooper’s contribution as a director.  True.  Spielberg is awesome and the family-urgency was likely a product of his influence.  But have these Poltergeist nay-sayers even seen Lifeforce!?!?!  Get ready for an AMAZING experience!

An investigative space mission is graced with the discovery of the millennium!  The astronauts unexpectedly encounter a 150-mile-long space vessel during an exploratory mission of Hailey’s Comet.  The influence of H. R. Giger is undeniable as the vessel’s interior has an organic motif, as if the explorers were entering the anatomy (even the womb) of a leviathan being—much as in Poltergeist (1982; late in the film) or Alien/Aliens (1979, 1986).  The spaceship’s inhabitants are all deceased, and they resemble bat people.  You may be thinking “Holy shit! Are we really only 6 minutes into the running time?” The answer is YES. This film has a LOT to offer and it wastes none of your time!

While most of the bat-like inhabitants are long dead, the explorers find three preserved, naked, uncannily human lifeforms in stasis chambers—two men, and a woman.  Then…something mysterious happens and the mission returns home with zero contact for thirty days.  So what happened on that ship that returned with no living crew members? It’s not as obvious as you may think.

It’s not until mid-story that Colonel Tom Carlsen (Steve Railsback; Alligator II: The Mutation, Barb Wire, Ed Gein), who was on the original exploratory mission, is recovered as the sole mission survivor in an escape pod to inform the military that an alien vessel was encountered…and what happened on that ship.  He comes back a changed man, and the only hope of hunting down the escaped female who is now wandering the streets of London and draining its inhabitants.

Our interstellar succubus (Mathilda May; The Jackal) is beyond stunning, supernaturally manipulative, and clearly is on some sort of life-draining mission of her own.  Her abilities infect our sexual weaknesses as well as our subconscious desires.  So much so that a grown man might feel compelled to kiss Patrick Stewart (Green Room, Dune).

For 1985 the special effects are fantastic!!!  Utilizing Star Wars-like rotoscoping for space scenes and Ghostbusters-style ectoplasm for supernatural life-sucking effects, you almost forget this film is over 30 years old.  The life-drained bodies are desiccated husks and the zombie-esque animatronics of their movement is impressive.

Not only are the effects genuinely fantastic, but the concepts are as well.  Classical vampire notions like the charming gaze, life-draining, telepathic links, and shapeshifting are clearly present, although cleverly modified.  When the astronauts first enter the alien spaceship, it feels “strangely familiar” and when Tom sees the preserved female (Mathilda May) he seems to be entranced.  And one can’t argue here, Mathilda May has entrancing boobs and a serious enthusiasm for kissing.  Most men would be powerless.

The first 20 minutes of this film are more substantial than most entire horror films.  I know…you’re thinking “really, John, but all the nudity.”  But you’d be wrong.  This film remains something special even if there was not a nipple to be seen.

Most interesting to me is how this 1985 movie, in the early HIV/AIDS era, captured the raw pansexuality of the vampire.  Much as Anne Rice’s Lestat, even a withered male husk can allure another man to his charm.  Although the “kiss” is admittedly more distant when male-to-male than when Mathilda tongue-wrangles her drained prey, infectious male-male kissing (or, at least, its implication) is quite frequent.  It seems that Hellraiser (1987) and Hellbound (1988) were influenced by the exquisite life-draining effects, which set the bar high.

The final segment erupts into an epidemic owing much to Dawn of the Dead (1978), with London immersed in a contagious essence-feeding maelstrom.  The effects are consistently high quality and the bat monster is awesome, but the gore doesn’t properly kick in until this third act.

Is this movie a work of film art? No.
Is it an amazing horror film? YES!
Does it have its fair share of heavy exposition? Sure.
Do I care? Not at all! They deliver it well and in plausible context.

This excellent horror film has my 100% backing.  I may have fallen in love with it as a teenager (understandably for the boobs, at that age), but now I would love it if there were not a single nipple to boast.  This film is smart, oddly elaborate without getting carried away with itself, and 96% serious in its delivery.  Unusual in many respects, and noteworthy in more, this is not the film to miss.

MY CALL:  Intense, beautiful, artificial, dangerous…and ultimately BRUTAL.  Difficult to explain—but even as a fan of brutal films, I’d say I “appreciated” this movie a lot more than I “enjoyed” it.  MORE MOVIES LIKE The Neon Demon:  Above all, Drive (2011) and Antichrist (2009).

Drive (2011) was an excellent yet soul-rattling film of sociopathy-laced catharsis; an intense, sensory, noirish tale so tone-sensitive that one would hardly notice the plot.  I loved it!  Director and writer Nicolas Winding Refn (Valhalla Rising, Drive, Only God Forgives) embarks on a similarly disorienting journey when an aspiring model moves to Los Angeles only to have her youth and vitality devoured by a group of beauty-obsessed women who will take any means necessary to possess what she has.

Scintillating from the first minute, the colors are vibrant and the score enchanting—somehow feeling gorgeous yet totally artificial.  Every effort is made to test our morality while taunting our senses, as if True Blood glamoring us.  Like Charlie or Alice, at first impressed by the magical wonders of Wonderland and Willy Wonka’s factory, only to eventually reveal their true nature; their dangers.

Imagine the prettiest teenage girl from a small Idaho town.  She’s probably the “Potato Princess” in the Cadillac for the 4^th of July parade and perpetually told her beauty would take her far in life and far from this little old town.  Fresh off the bus to Los Angeles and full of youth, beauty and naivete, Jesse (Elle Fanning; Super 8, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) is a young model succumbing to the most avant-garde artists’ whims.  Like a black lamb centering a snowy field, her stark innocence is readily apparent to the ever-vigil predatory denizens of the tree line preparing for the slaughter.  She is marinaded with compliments, if only to prepare her fair flesh for rending.

Some of the imagery and dialogue is coarse, with tongues sharpened.  Despite the lovely strobe-lit iridescence you can’t help but to momentarily react as if a small piece of metal had struck glass.  Perhaps aiming for a brutally honest revelation behind the curtain of the Los Angeles fashion industry, we find ourselves in blunt and shallow waters where we may encounter the kindest compliment one moment, only to be followed by a scathing remark the next—however, both delivered with a glimmering smile as if the speaker equally found pleasure in both.  Ah, Los Angeles—where small town girls’ big dreams come to die…or, more honestly put, to be crucified.

Pleasant and candid, Ruby (Jena Malone; Sucker Punch, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire & The Mockingjay) seems to actually care for Jesse’s well-being…but her intentions will be tested as the viewer comes to suspect everyone of foul play.  Rounding out the cast, Abbey Lee (Mad Max: Fury Road, Gods of Egypt) and Bella Heathcote (Dark Shadows, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) play immensely shallow models, Christina Hendricks (Drive, Mad Men) has a brief but wonderful role at the modeling agency, Jesse’s landlord is strangely played by Keanu Reeves (John Wick, 47 Ronin, Man of Tai Chi), and Desmond Harrington (Wrong Turn, Dexter) is an enigmatic photographer who is ghoulishly gaunt and enthralled in his own art.

A great many themes run amok in the third act.  Among such concepts are voyeurism, homicidally erotic shower scenes, bloody nudity, murderous models, strangely urinating in the moonlight, macabre vomit, gory self-mutilation, suicide, consuming thy enemy, and a diversity of severe mental illness.

This film observes Jesse’s rapid social degeneration, and her downward spiral finds peril in others’ jealousy and attraction to her.  The treacherous journey endures forced sexual advances, necrophilia, fixations leading to murderous behavior, a brutal fall from grace, and a blood of virgins finale.

This film may not paint the modeling industry in a positive light, but it is serenely shot with a fleeting sense of reality.  Like a model, many of the shots are perfect and beautiful.  But like the industry, the waters are shallow yet dangerous.

Highly recommended for fans of brutal, nourish films like Drive (2011).

MY CALL:  More of a slapstick, less credible, “bad movie” version of Wrong Turn (2003), offering less in almost every way…except for Henry Rollins.  Rollins and some over-the-top gore make this worth a watch for fans of the original.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Wrong Turn 2: Dead End:  Wrong Turn (2003), The Hills Have Eyes 1-2 (1977, 1984, 2006, 2007), Just Before Dawn (1981), The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) will all continue to satisfy the hillbilly horror subgenre.  Maybe Cabin Fever 1-3 (2002-2014) for the gore hounds.

Director Joe Lynch (Chillerama, Knights of Badassdom) picks up where Wrong Turn’s director Rob Schmidt left off in the Greenbriar Back Country of West Virginia.  Unfortunately, Lynch doesn’t do nearly as well, except when almost satirizing part 1 with slapstick gorefest violence.

This sequel features less flattering introductory shots of the Appalachian woods.  But I happily enjoyed the cameos in the opening sequence.  While on the phone with her agent her agent (Patton Oswalt; Odd Thomas), singer Kimberly Caldwell (as herself) makes the very same “wrong turn” that got those folks into trouble in Wrong Turn (2003) and hits a young mutant hillbilly.  The brutal tone is set immediately as the disfigured boy bites off her lips and she is cut top-to-bottom in half, dropping her intestines in a gore-slathered mess as we watch her legs fall in opposite directions!  If you don’t simply love that, then you may as well stop the movie right there.

Retired marine and TV show personality Dale (Henry Rollins; He Never Died, Feast) hosts Ultimate Survivor.  The contestants include the X Games athlete Jonesy (Steve Braun; The Skulls III, Pterodactyl), overly conceited Elena (Crystal Lowe; Insomnia, Final Destination 3), artist Nina (Scream Queen Erica Leerhsen; The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Book of Shadows: The Blair Witch 2), ex-football star Jake (Texas Battle; Final Destination 3), marine Amber (Daniella Alonso; The Hills Have Eyes 2, The Collector), and the recently deceased Kimberly Caldwell.  To win The Ultimate Survivor they need to endure five days in the wilderness.  Producers Mara (Aleksa Palladino; Holidays, The Ring Two) and M (Matthew Currie Holmes; The Fog) organize as Dale barks survivalist melodrama at the contestants.

As we meet our cast of victims, the acting wreaks of stagnant direct-to-DVD dialogue—the writers clearly didn’t care.  It just “feels bad.”  What holds it together is Henry Rollins.  Maybe I’m just a fan, but he seems to be the only one who cares about his role—or maybe he’s the only member of the cast the director liked.  His scenes produced the majority of entertaining action and decent on-screen kills.  It seems like this movie was made thinking of him, and to that end I withdraw my previous complaints about the film.

With head-cams on each contestant and hidden cameras throughout the forest, we watch as our victims wander into harm’s way.  We encounter deformed mountain men scalping people, shamefully forced gratuitous nudity, a messy birth scene of a monster baby, some decent after-the-fact gore, and a goofy incest scene.  Even if you consider Wrong Turn (2003) a “bad movie,” this is a “badder movie” that thankfully retains its so-bad-it’s-good status for our entertainment.  Attention was only aimed at over-the-top details (i.e., goofy incest) and not the atmospheric aspects (e.g., the inbred family cabin contains not a fraction of the macabre unkempt horror of part 1).

We have a new mutant redneck family that is a bit less animalistic than before.  Three-Finger returns from part 1 (played by a different actor) and is a less menacing, more slapstick farce of his former self.  And part 1’s gas station owner (Wayne Robson; Cube, Wrong Turn) is back and, for some reason, looks far healthier.

I don’t know about you, but I really loved Wrong Turn (2003). It was nothing stunning film-wise, but it scratches an itch I have every now and then—like when I want something brutal, but not The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974, 2003) brutal.  It cultivates a fun experience, has several recognizable actors and is highly rewatchable. The shots of the forest were gorgeous (when not CGI), there was thematic admixture of things feisty and dire, and the brutality was visceral!

This sequel, however, has zero cinematography worth mentioning.  All in all, this is a mixed bag.  The brutality (outside of the playful death of Kimberly Caldwell) is over-staged and uninspired in the first hour yet somehow spectacular in the third act.  The characters are bottom-of-the-barrel, but the inbred cannibal rednecks manage to live up to the hillbilly horror subgenre in the end after a stale early introduction.  We are never nervous, shocked or on edge.  Although you’ll enjoy more than a few gory chuckles during Henry Rollins’ scenes.  They reach sloppy delight status towards the end.

Rollins basically goes survivalist Rambo. He stitches himself up, escapes being butchered, detonates incestuous hillbillies, and makes explosive arrows.  He essentially saves this movie from complete unwatchability.  By the end, this was basically trying to be The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) with its macabre cannibal butchery, the dinner scene, and Dale’s crazed rescue mission into their lair.

Dead End (top); The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (bottom)

The first half of this movie may be terrible, but it might just be worth it for the last gloriously gut-sloppy 30 minutes and, of course, the opening sequence.  It becomes a great B-movie death scene mess of gore as bodies are literally ground into chum and offal.  Oh, and of course, it gives a direct nod to usher in future sequels.

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Summary: In last year’s Halloween special (Carpenter (1978) vs Zombie (2007)) John Carpenter’s masterpiece Halloween (1978) and Rob Zombie’s 2007 Halloween remake faced off. Well, it’s time for a rematch! This year we endure two of the craziest sequels in horror history: Halloween II (1981) and Halloween II (2009), and discuss their madness!

We answer the tough questions in this podcast!  For example…

“Is Ghostbusting a form of unlawful imprisonment? Do ghosts have rights?”

“Who are the creepiest horror kids?”

“Why don’t we like any of these Halloween victims?”

“Is there a motive-less female counterpart to Michael Myers?”

“Did Michael Myers just stop caring… or did the directors?”

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MY CALL:  Still a pretty fun watch for fans of mindless action and some occasionally decent gore, balanced by some terrible CGI and a lame boss.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Resident Evil:  The Silent Hill movies (2006, 2012) and the Underworld franchise (2003-2017) come to mind.

I remember seeing Resident Evil in theaters in 2002 (LOVED it; I was 21), again in 2003 after I bought the movie, and once more (rewatching parts 1-2) before seeing part 3 in 2007.  Three times I had seen it and I recall quite enjoying it. But it’s been ten years and I was easier to please back then.  So I wondered, how would these videogame-to-movie-adaptation films hold up to my criticism now…?

Profiteering from bioengineered virus technology (weaponized for the military) while masquerading as a home wares conglomerate whose products can be found in every household, the Umbrella Corporation is an original Proctor and Gamble…only evil.  Or at least one of their scientists was; the one who threw a glass vile of evil virus across the laboratory to volatilize through the vents and corrupt humanity.

Sometime after the incident, we find Alice (Milla Jovavich; The Fifth Element, Faces in the Crowd, Ultraviolet) with amnesia, leaving her memory as bare as her breasts.  Awakening naked in the shower in a lavish mansion, she has no idea who she is or how she got there.  She is taken by force by some sort of black ops team who expect her to remember much more than she does, and then things get interesting.

There’s a nice mix of characters, even if none of them ever develop into anything (except for more zombies, of course).  As Rain, Michelle Rodriguez (Furious 7, Machete Kills) continues her cute tough girl flavor that began with Girlfight (2000) and has persisted 17 years later (Fast & Furious 8).  In that vein, she has sort of a Hicks and Vasquez (Aliens) relationship with a colleague, both part of a larger team infiltrating the Hive and taking Alice along for the ride.  We also find Spence (James Purefoy; The Following, Rome, High-Rise) who, along with Alice, works for the Umbrella Corporation protecting the Hive’s entrance… but now neither of them remember that.

We come to learn that The Hive, a subterranean research megaplex below Raccoon City, has an artificial intelligence: the Red Queen.  Her defense systems whittle down the infiltration team and at least one such scene really stuck with me.  To that end, the effects held up well enough and included some much-appreciated nuance. The CGI was pretty damned good for some parts and very bad for others.  For example, after getting laser-cubed, a soldier’s eyeball leaks some white goo before its severed parts fell asunder.  I also liked the zombie dogs, which were less CGI and more live dog covered in goo suits.  On the other hand, certain zombies missing chunks of their face were blaring examples of obsolete CGI technology and the main monster almost looked as it would in the actual videogame complete with 128-bit graphics.  The boss creature was little more than a dumb tongue-lashing monster depicted as a CGI mess. I preferred the dogs and the chop suey lasers over this nondescript beast.

Director and writer Paul W. S. Anderson (Mortal Kombat, Event Horizon, Soldier) did justice to the popular videogame with this popular horror-action franchise starter.  The movie may lean on heavy exposition (e.g., the introductory narration)—but, hey, so did the game.  A lot of it is videogamified over-the-top…and that’s okay sometimes.  We have Milla jumping off walls to do jump kicks like Donnie Yen or Carrie-Anne Moss.  But I don’t mind at all.

A major shortcoming for me was that the zombie action scenes were all pretty weak.  The bites were lame, the horde was uninspired, and outside of a few zombie kills by Milla, I could have done without them entirely.  It felt like stock footage from The Walking Dead—you know, the kills you don’t really care about as the characters kill their way from points A to B.  Although I did enjoy our first meetings with zombies as the team was learning what they were (i.e., not alive).

In the end, a bunch of Umbrella scientists “just appear” as Alice and our other surviving (but clearly infected) hero escape the Hive.  Back to the exposition, one says: “He’s mutating. I want him in the Nemesis program…we’re re-opening the Hive…”  Aaaaannnnnd cue the sequel as Alice wakes up again, now in a lab, and stumbles into the Apocalypse!

So there you have it.  There’s nothing particularly thoughtful to be found here, yet still a lot of effort was evident behind making this fun and exciting.  It came as no surprise that it was successful and infected multiple sequels.

MY CALL:  Many consider this sequel superior to part 1.  I’m middle of the road.  The action is better but the writing seems worse, with the clichés turned up—a lot.  Still a pretty fun watch, though.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Resident Evil:  Resident Evil (2002), Doom (2005), the Silent Hill movies (2006, 2012) and the Underworld franchise (2003-2017) come to mind.

Narrated by Alice (Milla Jovovich; The Fifth Element, Resident Evil, Ultraviolet), a brief flashback montage catches us up with the story, which picks right up where it left off in 2002 as suited-up Umbrella technicians re-open the Hive.

Like part 1, Alice once again awakens quite scantily clad with no clue where she is.  This time in a surgical gown…errrr…a “piece” of one.  LOL. They sure do like having her wake up with a heavy dose of legs and side boob.  She has also clearly been operated upon or the subject of experimentation.  Alice wanders outside the facility to find the streets of Racoon City barren—a newspaper headlined “The Dead Walk” blows by.  Nice touch, right?  We come to find that after her capture at the end of part 1 she had been dosed with the T-virus (a special strain, I suppose), making her a superhuman killing machine.

Picking up where Paul W. S. Anderson (Resident Evil, Mortal Kombat, Event Horizon, Soldier) left off, newcomer director Alexander Witt (his only directorial feature, by the way) has turned the clichés up hard. Supercop Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory; Eragon, The Time Machine) slips out of her heels and into her Lara Croft Tomb Raider gear to solve Racoon City’s zombie apocalypse one headshot at a time in her tight breasty tube top and short-shorts; Carlos (Oded Fehr; The Mummy) likewise receives a nonsense-fueled opening action sequence; and the highly melodramatically written Dr. Ashford (Jared Harris; The Quiet Ones, Poltergeist) wheels out of his McMansion all smarty-pantsish like Professor Xavier.  There is also no shortage of various things random like ridiculous gratuitous acrobatics, zombies rising from the shallowest graves ever, no one ever missing a shot, topless zombie prostitutes, and yet more generally poor writing.

Racoon City is quarantined, trapping all within along with the virus-raging zombies.  Among those trapped is Dr. Ashford’s young daughter.  Safely watching from outside the city, Ashford agrees to help Alice and Valentine escape if they can rescue her.  It’s all very Escape from New York-ish (1981). Trapped in a city of undesirables, our bad-ass hero is infected with a virus and will find a grim outcome nearing the end of the film unless she can save the daughter of a scientist who waits safely outside the city.

There’s just one problem.  The “Nemesis Program” (mentioned at the end of part 1) is activated, awakening Alice’s old buddy who has now mutated into an unrecognizably hulking dreadnought resembling Hellraiser’s (1987) Chatterbox on steroids.

This sequel, much as its predecessor, features the lamest zombie scenes—all phoned in and clearly wastes of film and make-up.  However, once Alice fights the Nemesis hulk, things get REALLY entertaining.  I’m not a fan of the 30’ Crouching Tiger Jedi jumps, the canned fight scenes, or how thousands of bullets perpetually miss Alice despite having no cover and minimal evasive maneuvers.  But the action sequence is really quite entertaining.  I roll my eyes more here than at the original, and part 1 was clearly better written (in my opinion), but this sequel truly succeeds at being more FUN however over-the-top it may be.

After a better final boss battle than part 1 offered, there is a still a lot to be desired in the fighting photography and choreography.  Even when featuring a hand-to-hand combat action finale, this sequel is clearly more about big explosions and blatant exposition than the quality of anything between. But again, it’s fun.  And I’m grateful that the final boss wasn’t another miscarriage of bad CGI.

We end very much how we began—and paralleling how part 1 ended and began—with Alice recovered by Umbrella, naked (Amen for boobs, right guys?), and yet again the subject of further experimentation by Dr. Isaacs (Iain Glen; Game of Thrones, Darkness).  No points for originality, but I enjoyed the ending anyway.  I enjoyed the whole thing.

Much as part 1 ended with the initiation of its sequel’s premise, so does part 2 leave the doors wide open for part 3: “Initiate the Alice Program.”  I’d say keep going if you liked either of the first two.  There’s nothing particularly thoughtful to be found here, yet still a lot of effort was evident behind making this fun and exciting.

MY CALL:  Better written than part 2 and just as fun as both its predecessors, Extinction offers a fun thrill-ride of mutant zombie action for Millaphiles as the franchise story continues to evolve with the T-virus.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Resident Evil:  Resident Evil (2002), Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004), Doom (2005), the Silent Hill movies (2006, 2012) and the Underworld franchise (2003-2017) come to mind.  For a fine ratings vs earnings comparison of the Resident Evil and Underworld franchises check this feisty article out.

So, as we enter the third installment in Alice’s (Milla Jovovich; The Fifth Element, Resident Evil 1-2, Ultraviolet) virus-geddon apocalypse saga, she strangely wakes up EXACTLY as she did in part 1, in the same shower, puts on the same dress, encounters the same death-laser hallway and some other high-tech boobie-traps…but wait…then…she dies!?!?!?!  And then Dr. Isaacs (Iain Glen; Game of Thrones, Darkness, Resident Evil: Apocalypse), in a routine tone, gives an order to dispose of the body…?

Director Russell Mulcahy (Razorback, Highlander 1-2) swings for the fences, accelerating our zombie apocalypse into the desolate wasteland phase.  Alice narrates a brief flashback introduction to catch us up with the story, which picks up a bit after where it left off in 2004—with Alice wandering the apocoscape of the now Walking Dead­-ified world in which people will do anything to survive.  Moreover, the zombie-action feels more like a zombie movie at the times when it should (i.e., the zombie aspect doesn’t suck like it did in than parts 1-2)—even the zombie “setting” felt more zombie-appropriate.  This is the first of the series to get zombies right and the swarming murder of zombie crows was a nice touch that yielded high impact.

The Resident Evil films—regardless of their lack of critical claim—consistently deliver creative shots.  Here, the grand sweeping scale of the futuristic sandy Hellscape speckled with plague-swarms of undead birds crisply contrasting the sky compounds this measure powerfully.  Watch this in HD or 4K if you can.  As our survivors combat winged pestilence with flame-throwers the beautiful crispness smacks of a less refined Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), even if only for a minute. It is a spectacle, that fire against the sky.  Comparable scenes include brilliant lighting in the laser-trap hallway (2002) and the closing scenes during Alice’s escape (2004).

New to the Zompocalypse crew, Claire (Ali Larter; House on Haunted Hill, Final Destination 1-2, Heroes) joins Carlos (Oded Fehr; The Mummy, Resident Evil: Apocalypse) and others from part 2 as a team of nomadic Zombiegeddon survivalists.  And in this third installment, the Zombiegeddon world-building is in full force. We get a solid feel for the scavenging, odd skill sets, and limiting resources very quickly.

I feel like the stunts in this sequel eclipse those of parts 1-2 (in which they felt totally phoned in). I also remain grateful for the zombie dogs which are consistently done with practical effects in parts 1-3.  The zombie dog gore was simple, but worked very well. And the superhuman jumps were less Crouching Tiger (as in slower) and more Blade II (i.e., more dynamic).

Alice has become something different than before.  We have watched he evolve from highly trained (2002) to a virus-fueled superhuman (2004), and now develop telekinetic psychic powers worthy of the X-Men.  But despite this, from her demeanor to her fight choreography, I find Alice a more credible heroine now than ever.  Perhaps helping her credibility is that in this third installment she may be naked, but she affords eager viewers no nudity this time around.  Although she does continue to wear thin shirts and no bra.  You know, just keepin’ it classy. LOL.

Our final boss bad guy in this installment is easily the most satisfying of these first three movies.  The CGI still clearly appears dated, but this creature looks far more interesting and twisted and the final fight doesn’t suck for a change. When our favorite mad scientist becomes infected and mutates, he becomes a fungus-like tentacle monster.  It’s fun.  In fact, the whole movie is.  I’m quite surprised this one gets so much flack.  I loved it.  I’ve loved rewatching the series so far and I think their entertainment value holds up quite well.

Just as each movie began where the last ended and clearly indicated that a sequel was on the way, so does Alice here announce her intentions to murderously climb up the corporate ladder for the higher-up Umbrella execs who seek her blood which is apparently the key; the next evolution of the T-virus.  Stay tuned to see how part 4 (Afterlife) holds up…

MY CALL:  Much more hokey and corny than part 1, this senselessly discontinuous sequel remains a gory, gooey B-movie pleasure.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Warlock 2:  Well, of course, Warlock (1989). Some other “part 2s” that are decidedly zanier and gooier than their predecessors include Wishmaster 2 (1999), Gremlins 2 (1990), Leprechaun 2 (1994) and Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988).

Director Anthony Hickox (Waxwork, Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth) opens this sequel with some on-screen text providing the exposition that the writing and direction evidently could not.  Allow me to paraphrase: “Druids have protected us from evil forever…blah, blah, blah…and once every thousand years they perform some magic ritual to prevent the birth of the son of Satan.”  In the subsequent scene these druids align their rune stones or whatever and—don’t panic…relax!  They stopped evil from overtaking the world.

But now, with another thousand years behind us, the threat resurges.  The moon eclipses as a young woman puts on a rune stone necklace preparing for a date.  Gazing at the dwindling moonlight, she is overtaken by a spectral force (as in the entirely non-consensual The Entity), her abdomen erupts in instantaneous pregnancy, and a brain-like creature is messily birthed.  The mass of slime-covered organs pulsates, kills the woman’s Pomeranian, and from it—as if from a cocoon—emerges a naked newborn witch (Julian Sands; Warlock, Gothic) fully grown, exposing his man bits, and covered in goo.  The effects remind me a bit of Wishmaster 2 (1999) or when all the gremlins are melting in Gremlins 2 (1990)—it’s awesomely gross and the most memorable part of the movie.

The medieval action scenes were so not good; boring, in fact.  But it’s just here to set the stage for present day, when things get appropriately gory.  The birth scene was pretty cool if you like sloppy gory messes—which I do!  Our male witch also inserts his hand into a woman’s head, cooks a map onto his unwilling mother’s flesh and peels it from her stomach, tears the entire scalp off a hooker, and causes some gory death scenes.  Unfortunately, most effects-driven scenes fall flat except for the birth scene.  Brief cameos by Zach Galligan (Gremlins 1-2, Waxwork 1-2) and Joanna Pacula (The Kiss, Virus) add some entertaining turns to this ride, perhaps asking some forgiveness for the weak kills.

Much as how our spellcaster sought the pages of the Grand Grimoire spread across the country in Warlock (1989), in this sequel the Devil tasks him with finding the six rune stones in six days.  Naturally we’ll need some protagonists, so Samantha (Paula Marshall; Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth, Nip/Tuck) and her boyfriend Kenny are destined to save the world.

Kenny’s father Will (Steve Kahan; Lethal Weapon 1-4, Predator 2, Demolition Man) senses that something is amiss after witnessing an omen, and gathers his local buddies (R. G. Armstrong; Children of the Corn, Predator; and Charles Hallahan; The Thing, The Twilight Zone: The Movie) who are all apparently part of some modern druid society that expected the Warlock’s arrival and has the magical cockroach-powered compass (from part 1) to hunt him.

Quite self-aware, the movie playfully mentions Merlin and Faust. But these cheeky moments, not even in combination with the aforementioned cameos, in no way compensate for all the bad that was jammed into this hokey sequel.  At times this movie is trying so hard to be serious, but more often than not it fails.  But please be reminded, as a “bad horror movie” I rather enjoyed it.

The rushed pacing diminishes the effect of many death scenes and gore.  They may draw grins, but they won’t impress (except for the opening and closing gore scenes).  Many of the kills were totally phoned in, and with no real build-up or sense of consequence.  After all, this witch intends to bring about the Armageddon.  I feel like the movie forgets this apocalyptic ambition after the first few scenes.  Warlock (1989) had a story to tell, but this sequel seems to add far more silliness than substance.  It has its gory victories, but overall this not a good film (I’d go so far as to call it a B-movie).  Quite bad actually, and more so towards the end.

Ultimately the warlock, the Armageddon and the Devil himself were thwarted with a Jeep’s floodlights (yes, I’m totally serious and it’s easily as boring as it sounds), followed by an unspeakably bad magical duel involving a CGI dagger (not exactly the most exciting way to prevent Armageddon). Lame! But at least we close on a gooey gory note as the Warlock rots and melts away.

SIDEBAR about Franchise Continuity: Did this movie completely ignore that the events of part 1 even happened!?!?!?!  They seem 100% unrelated.  The first Warlock (1989) was sent to the future to assemble a book that would provide access to Earth for Satan.  So where did this new Warlock come from?  Also another time?  Was this just a second time travel attempt from 1800s Salem that went unmentioned?  And if so, why now crystals and druids instead of the pages of the Grand Grimoire?  Or is this more like the Leprechaun franchise theory that each movie featured a completely different Leprechaun (despite being played with the same personality and by the same actor)?  Perhaps, and if so, then there are numerous different prophecies which can bring Hell on Earth and for each prophecy a Julian Sands look-alike to expedite it.  Seems farfetched.

MY CALL:  The Matrix trilogy and Guillermo del Toro’s slack-jawed tentacle-vampires meet Silent Hill in this least entertaining Resident Evil sequel.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Resident Evil:  Resident Evil (2002), Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004), Resident Evil: Extinction (2007), Doom (2005), the Silent Hill movies (2006, 2012) and the Underworld franchise (2003-2017) come to mind.  For a fine ratings vs earnings comparison of the Resident Evil and Underworld franchises check this feisty article out.

Paul W. S. Anderson (Resident Evil, Mortal Kombat, Event Horizon, Soldier) returns to the beloved Zompocalypse franchise and, apparently, he thought he was directing a Matrix sequel. No sooner are we re-acquainted with Alice (Milla Jovovich; The Fifth Element, Resident Evil 1-3, Ultraviolet) than we see her in Blade II ninja gear running across walls and spiraling through the air dodging slow-motion machine gun fire as bullet casings rain to the ground, their chiming on the floor punctuated by the hum of her twin katanas as she minces her way through dozens of Umbrella SWAT guards.

Coming after Wesker (Shawn Roberts; xXx: The Return of Xander Cage) at the Tokyo Umbrella headquarters, Alice has come full-force with twin Uzis, a leather and tights ensemble, and—as she promised at the end of Extinction—a whole bunch of her(s).  Despite the impressively attractive army of Jovo-clones, her plan backfires when Wesker neutralizes her T-virus; stripping her of her superpowers.

The franchise has taken us from the heart of Raccoon City to the Las Vegas desert and now we are swept to the beautiful Alaskan wilderness where the now human Alice is reacquainted with Claire (Ali Larter; House on Haunted Hill, Final Destination 1-2, Resident Evil: Extinction), and off to a dilapidated Hollywood where several survivors (including a slimy Kim Coates; Sons of Anarchy, Innocent Blood) have taken refuge in a prison besieged by zombies.

As the franchise progresses, so does the virus.  The hastened zombies now have quad-unhinging tentacle jaws (like Blade II’s vampire meets Hellboy’s Sammael; both predating Afterlife) and are joined by a giant axe-wielding hooded ogre (think Silent Hill’s pyramid head; also predating Afterlife).  It looks cool but both the film and the monsters execute poorly.

Despite all the action (and there’s a lot), the quality of the special effects seem to have dropped considerably since Extinction and I was unimpressed with the explosions and fights.  I’m not sure if this was an actual budget issue, or if Anderson dedicated so much attention to how this would look in 3-D that he never stopped to consider how it would look on a television.  Perhaps it was all much prettier with red and blue glasses on the big screen…?

Alice and Claire fight the giant ogre mutant and, outside of the monster looking cool, it bored me.  Yes, there was slow-motion giant axe-throwing, slow-motion water pipes bursting and slow-motion sliding across the wet floor by soaking wet ladies.  But I’ve got news for you, Anderson, slow-motion does not equal good.  It’s a shame, too.  Anderson clearly tried to make this a worthy rollercoaster of excitement to follow up parts 1-3…but…Alice running in slow-motion through a field of head-bursting zombies with quarter-roll buckshot just isn’t doing it for me. I miss Russell Mulcahy (Razorback, Highlander 1-2, Resident Evil: Extinction)…can we bring him back?

Dodging slow-motion bullets and sunglasses, the black leather-clad Wesker goes full-on Agent Smith, hellbent on “consuming” Alice as she is—wait for it—“the one” who can help him tame the T-virus. #MatrixEyeRoll

The highlights of this movie include the sheer fun of an army of Alices in the opening sequence, gorgeous shots of Alaska, the crisp sweeping interior shots of the ship Arcadia’s lower research decks, and the return of the weirder-than-ever zombie dogs.  The story is developed a bit and we are introduced to the Umbrella heart spiders, but nothing feels further explained; another weak point of this installment.

I have had a blast revisiting parts 1-3. However, I can comfortably say that this Zombiegeddon sequel was by far the least gratifying and least entertaining.

Resident Evil is like the Fast and Furious franchise of horror action in that they are always already planning on part 5 before part 4 hits theaters; complete with closing scenes revealing premise points with future villains.  Watch out for the Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory; Resident Evil: Apocalypse, The Time Machine) stinger at the end—as every other Resident Evil film has so far to harbinger its soon-to-come sequel.

MY CALL:  This senselessly stupid not-so-sexy hardly-a-succubus movie makes no sense. Neither the title nor any brief synopses can reveal how random this film is.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Evil Clutch:  This film created expectations of sleazy horror but failed to deliver.  So for more effective sleazy low budget horror try Breeders (1986), Evils of Night (1985), The Haunting of Morella (1990), Head of the Family (1996), Hideous! (1997), Bio Slime (2010) and Night of the Tentacles (2013). For similarly obscure horror movies that are bad but still make a notable effort on the effects try Superstition (1982), Ghosthouse (1988), Night Angel (1990) or Def By Temptation (1990).

IMDB says: “The story of a hideous monster who takes the form of a beautiful, seductive woman who in a torrent of special effects, beauty and monster transform into a climax of pure evil. For years this monster woman has cursed a small village, and to this day her deadly grasps holds the peaceful residents in fear. This ferocious, feminine fury possesses a shocking sensual appetite and she can only satisfy her lust when passion consumes her, by striking where a man is most vulnerable…. and the results are deadly!”  Right about NOW is when we should stop trusting IMDB and especially stop trusting misleading movie posters.

Written and directed by Andreas Marfori—not known at all for is not at all classic Ataga sovetskikh zombie—this super low budget 80s Italian horror movie will draw giggles only from those in search of the bad and campy.

Seduced by a strange and sultry woman, a young man is brutally gored by her hairy clawed crotch tentacle.  Yes, you read that right.  A hairy tentacle with a claw at the end, emerging from this succubus’ nether region, killed a man.  The effects are nothing to brag about, but they’re easily good enough to entertain fans of cheap horror and, hey, it tries.

Our sex-hungry murderess (who might be able to fly, not sure because the film is so poorly made) is picked up by a tourist couple (including Coralina Cataldi-Tassoni; Mother of Tears, Opera, Demons 2) who are subsequently warned about her by the weirdest possible man they could find in this tiny village among the Italian countryside.  The creepy local—who might just be the only local they find other than the crotch tentacle lady—unloads an elaborate regional history about summoning monsters.  Clearly our couple has found one.

This senselessly stupid film includes beer turning to sand, random zombie things, strange cauldrons of infectious goo, and the weirdest cuckoo clock ever.  Apparently, the demoness is trying to afflict the couple with something.  But it’s hard to understand what’s even supposed to be going on as our couple hikes into the Alps with this weird stranger.

Other than the crotch claw, the effects and events of the 50 minutes are all rather dull. In the last 30 minutes things pick up and we are bombarded by diverse weirdness.  There is more crotch tentacle, weird monstrous (maybe tree root) tentacles, clothes-on zombie love, an unseen POV Evil Dead force rushing through the forest, crusty zombie attacks, bloody dismemberment and some weak demonic transformation.  Yes, this may sound good…but it’s bad. Very, very bad. And you’ll probably only enjoy this if a bad horror movie is exactly what you were hoping to find.

The title seems quite misleading.  Our demoness implies sexuality and seduction, but never seems to consummate anything. So, I’d struggle to understand how an “evil clutch” would ever come to be…nor was any infernal offspring of hers even implied.

In summary, this movie is horrible.  It’s horrible, but it’s enjoyably horrible if you are in the mood for horrible and horrible draws laughter from you.  Whole lot of horrible, but I’ve admittedly watched, reviewed and even enjoyed far, far worse.

MY CALL:  This intellectualized mysterious autopsy film procures an outstanding premise in the first half, followed by a somewhat random second half that doesn’t measure up.  Take that for what it is, watch it anyway, and temper your expectations. It’s pretty damn neat.  MORE MOVIES LIKE The Autopsy of Jane Doe:  After.Life (2009), Unrest (2006), Deadgirl (2008).

After the mysterious body of a dead girl is found half-buried but otherwise unscathed in the basement of a brutally murdered elderly couple, the cadaver is passed to the care of father and son coroners Austin (Emile Hirsch; The Darkest Hour, Into the Wild) and Tommy (Brian Cox; Troy, Trick ‘r Treat, The Ring).

Director André Øvredal (Trollhunter) is a master of atmosphere and characters—and it shows.  The opening murder scene is calm yet dire, and we are transitioned to the playfully light-hearted father-son apprenticeship, complete with endearingly quizzical learning experiences cast over a gory burnt corpse.  These two are very close and it’s obvious. I love that. They bring a positive and dynamic energy enhanced by the film’s soundtrack.

As they begin the autopsy of their Jane Doe (Olwen Catherine Kelly), there are numerous medical anomalies; oddly small waist, curiously cloudy eyes, cold body temp but no rigor mortis, a severed tongue, bleeding…  But that’s hardly the beginning. The weirdness continues to be laid on thick as Tommy provides fleetingly thin hypotheses to explain one extremely rare oddity after another—any one of which alone would give a cadaver quite an unusual story to tell.  So, what story does Jane Doe’s body have to tell?  And why does her seemingly fresh body not externally match what is internally suggested?

There is a lot of nudity but it is not at all sultry. This is about an autopsy, after all—it’s not like they do these with the body clothed.  And not to such extent as, perhaps, a Saw film, but the gore was medically visceral.  As strange internal tissue trauma is discovered we have a front row seat to lacerated organs, flaps of tissue, and the crunching sound of cutting through a ribcage. It might make you moderately uncomfortable, but in a good way.

Theories will fire wildly in your head as you watch this.  Is she a vampire, a victim of some torture or ritual, a demon or undead thing, a vessel containing a demon…something else entirely?  You’ll wonder even more as strange things begin to happen inside the mortuary.  They are not subtle, and rouse unease.

When in doubt: burn it.

I was very entertained by this film and found the first 30-40 minutes to be absolutely outstanding. However, I cannot say the same for the ensuing hour, which felt like a very different and completely inferior film. Our once thoughtful and rational characters, all of a sudden, lost their intellect and wisdom and don’t even bat an eye at the most alarming things; they were basically written like dummies for the last 40 minutes.  Not scared people who, thus, stopped thinking straight—but dummies. I’m not really sure what happened. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t hate the second half…but if you told me that an entirely different (and far less capable) director and writer did the second half of the film, I’d completely believe it.  It’s like the first 30-40 minutes was written as an exquisitely mysterious short story with a cliff hanger…and then it was forced into a feature length script that had to build another 60 pages to try and explain everything.

But for the fantastic novelty and mystery of the first half, I remain overall quite pleased and still highly recommend this.  Just temper your expectations accordingly.

MY CALL:  Complete, awesome absurdity is what we have here in this highly ambitious horror classic.  Here’s my take on the plot: a supernatural funeral director who occasionally seduces men (in the form of a young woman) employs bladed flying murder balls to kill people who interfere with his mission to create undead midgets whom he outsources as slave labor on an ultra-high gravity planet.  I shouldn’t need to explain who will like this film.  You know who you are.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Phantasm:  There is little out there that compares to this film, so I’ll just suggest Phantasm II (1988) and perhaps the subsequent sequels up to part 5.

Writer/director Don Coscarelli (The Beastmaster, Bubba Ho-Tep) sets an admirably uneasy mood.  We are thrown off guard right away with a smorgasbord of weird; dead calm shots of the mausoleum are striking and dire while beautiful and well-lit, but the marble chamber and the nearby funeral parlor are populated by diminutive evil beings (they look like Jawas) disturbing our sense of calm.

Pallbearers at his brother’s funeral, Jody (Bill Thornbury; Phantasm 2-5) and ice cream man Reggie (Reggie Bannister; Phantasm 2-5, Wishmaster) rekindle an old friendship while Jody stays in town taking care of now-orphaned teenager Michael (A. Michael Baldwin; Phantasm 2-5).

Perhaps for witnessing something he shouldn’t have seen, Michael finds himself followed by the skulking evil midgets that inhabit the funeral home and cemetery.  These malevolent sprites lead Jody and Reggie to greater other-worldly threats.  This threat and the Tall Man’s motives go largely unexplained.  He’s simply the tall, evil old man who runs the Morningside Funeral Parlor.

The Tall Man (Angus Scrimm; Phantasm 2-5, Subspecies, Wishmaster) is sufficiently gruff, supernaturally strong, and shapeshifts into a lady dressed in lavender (Kathy Lester; Phantasm III, Phantasm: Ravager) to seduce men or serve as disguise.  While we never witness them interact directly, it is implied that the evil dwarves work with him.

You can’t discuss Phantasm without mentioning the balls.  The effects were great, with the murderous chrome spheres flying throw the air (excellent and seamless rotoscoping, by the way), unsheathing blades, impaling victims, and drilling into their heads!  The gore is sufficient as blood gushes in bright red and mustard yellow. More silly than scary and an example of a cheap effect, a severed finger transforms into a furry monster beetle (for apparently no real reason at all).

If this all sounds weird, please understand we’re just getting started.  Apparently, the Tall Man is transforming dead people into his growling hooded dwarf servants and there is a portal to another dimension, to which he apparently outsources this labor force…to do…something.  Don’t expect any explanations.

These somewhat sci-fi concepts are introducing us to a greater theme that is only partially realized in this film.  As if world-building, Coscarelli is setting the stage for something of grander scale by letting us know that these things exist, without getting into the why’s.  At one point Michael visits a creepy fortune-teller and her telepathically linked granddaughter who subject him to a Dune-like “fear box” test.  But why?  Why are there truly supernatural diviners and why do they “prepare” young Michael for his future challenges (i.e., the Tall Man)?  Why does the Tall Man turn into a young woman, why always in a lavender dress, and why not someone else?

SIDEBAR with SPOILERS:  There’s a lot going on here.  The Tall Man is reanimating human corpses as evil compact dwarves so that their now denser bodies can handle the greater gravity of another planet, in which the dwarves serve as slaves.  We don’t know why, or to do what, or exactly where or for whom.  This is all somehow revealed to Michael (through a telepathic link perhaps) when he momentarily passes the portal and witnesses the harsh world on the other side.  Is it Hell, or another planet in a nearby solar system?  Are there other portals?  Is the Tall Man the head bad guy, or the equivalent of a Vegas pit boss or regional salesman/recruiter?  Who knows?  After watching this, we sure don’t!  As far as ambitious stories go, Phantasm is like the horror Avatar (2009) of the 1970s.  Unfortunately, only so much can be revealed with 88 minutes and a humble budget.
In the end, Reggie is consoling Michael that all of this (i.e., the entire movie’s events) was a bad dream, that Jody died in a car accident and that he would take care of him.  Then it ends much as A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) subsequently would, with the Tall Man inexplicably and randomly getting his due. “Booooooooooooy!”

This film felt scary when I saw it 20 years ago, but unlike The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) the scares definitely didn’t survive the test of time.  However, the eerie atmosphere, intriguing original story and special effects continue to impress me.  Also, as satisfyingly unusual as this story is, by today’s standards it feels sloppily told and haphazardly stitched together.  That said, I remain quite impressed with this original product.  This film may not feel organized, but it still has a lot of good to offer the genre and its story stands out even today.

MY CALL:  Maybe nothing special, but still worth a watch. This captivity-based psychological horror takes some unexpected and satisfying turns, but won’t wow you with reveals.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Pet:  The Gift (2015), Swimfan (2002), Dread (2009), Hunger (2009).

Rigidly awkward yet seemingly well-mannered and kind-hearted, Seth (Dominic Monaghan; Lost, The Day) works at an animal shelter and enjoys the dogs’ company as if they were his only taste of friendship. He happens upon Holly (Ksenia Solo; Black Swan, Lost Girl, Orphan Black), an old high school crush of his, and shines an interest which goes completed unreciprocated.

Unfortunately for Holly, Seth is one to fixate.  It’s a bit endearing at first as he rehearses asking her out on a date in front of the mirror, but more than a bit troubling when he studies her social media as if her affection were a test he could pass.  Seth becomes a bit obsessive, things get weird…you know how it goes.

What caught my attention was the very credible obsession that overcame Seth, who remained completely unable to understand how the object of his interest didn’t share his feelings.  I’ve seen it.  I feel, at some point, we all probably saw this happen to (or with) someone we knew.

As if Seth prayed to the Gods of Cliché Horror Convenience, the animal shelter has an abandoned wing with a cellar.  A little anesthesia and some online welding tutorials and presto—Seth has himself a caged pet he can visit during his lunch break.  He keeps Holly captive and systematically starves and conditions her to psychologically breaking her.  Here’s the thing…Seth may not be the only sick person in this relationship.  As the story progresses, the lines get a little blurred as to who is manipulating whom, who is using whom, who is torturing whom.

As director Carles Torrens (Apartment 143) guides us on our journey in this psychological thriller we find some brutal and gory scenes, some plot turns I wouldn’t have expected, and a lot of manipulation.

This film may not be anything special but it highly succeeded at entertaining me. It started a bit slow and plainly formulaic, but developed into something worthy of my time—even if I’ll never see it again since it’s more “neat” than “good.” I also enjoyed the ending—far from perfect, but endings are where most horror movies fall apart anyway, right? So let’s give credit where it’s due.

MY CALL:  If you’re in the mood for a sexy demon movie and have low to moderate expectations, this is for you!  MORE MOVIES LIKE Siren:  V/H/S (2012) and V/H/S Viral (2014) for reasons detailed in the review below. Also, note the Horror Romance Sidebar below for other suggestions.

Images (above) from Amateur Night

Based on the wildly popular “Amateur Night” segment from V/H/S (2012), director Gregg Bishop (who directed V/H/S Viral’s popular segment Dante the Great) combines our favorite actors from Dante the Great and Amateur Night in this feature length spin-off. This is exactly what we hope will happen after seeing great short films in horror anthologies.

Jonah is a nice guy.  Jonah (Chase Williamson; The Guest, John Dies at the End) is having his bachelor party and his hyper-active best man Mac (Michael Aaron Milligan; Shark Lake, V/H/S Viral segment Dante the Great) naturally goes overboard and makes it all about strippers and debauchery.

The feisty nature of the early scenes help make up for the writing and acting that just aren’t there.  It’s introductory fun-spiritedness journeys us to a ho-hum strip club with unmotivated lap dances, some standard comedy set ups that might draw a smile (e.g., B-squad strippers fumbling about the stage), and some sophomoric bro chat.  Mac encounters a slick stranger at the bar who invites them to a “more serious” and rather remote venue.  And that’s when things get weird.

The opening scene brings a partial explanation of the supernatural being commandeered by Mr. Nyx (Justin Welborn; V/H/S Viral segment Dante the Great, The Final Destination, The Crazies, The Signal).  Nyx is the proprietor of the secret strip club where we find Lily (Hannah Fierman; V/H/S segment Amateur Night), who has a “hint” of her true nature (harkening back to Amateur Night for those who have seen it).  Her origin is suggestive that she is a demon from Hell—like a succubus.  Only this seductress has a Siren’s song that will weaken the minds of men.  It mashes up a couple different fabled temptress creatures (the succubus and the siren) and doesn’t really explain outside of a summoned infernal origin.

Now I liked this but I’m just gonna’ come out and say it: between the acting and writing quality this feels a lot like a direct-to-DVD movie with decent production value.  I enjoyed the film, but it did little to impress and it just doesn’t seem to deserve a theatrical release (and I don’t think it got one). But despite these shortcomings the movie is enjoyable—to men anyway, I’m sure.

You see, Lily spends most of the movie naked. Like, 100% extremely don’t-watch-this-with-your-girlfriend naked.  On top of that, and catering to my standard horror hound preferences, she ends up dowsed in the blood of her victims, her monster make-up looks cool (although the CGI bat wings and tail aren’t exactly top notch), and there is a demon sex scene.  Bloody breasts and demon sex…isn’t that what horror is all about? LOL.

Horror Romance Sidebar: There’s also something satisfying about romantic connections in horror.  In this movie and Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992), the monster desires a protagonist; in An American Werewolf in Paris (1997), Spring (2014) and Return of the Living Dead Part 3 (1993) the romantic connection is mutual; and Bride of Frankenstein (1935) is considered by many to be the greatest horror sequel of all time.

Look, this film isn’t awesome. It’s not as good as Dante the Great or Amateur Night.  But here’s what it is: a satisfying movie for horror hounds with simple taste.  People can criticize the “quality of the film.”  But that doesn’t strike me as what this was all about. This movie serviced the demand for the story behind Amateur Night’s adorable monster.  And in that, it succeeded.

MY CALL:  Despite not having much of a story, the characters and creature development breathe heavy tension into Life. It’s a satisfying rollercoaster of fun, but packs none of the moral or heroic punch of Alien (1979).  MORE MOVIES LIKE Life:  Species (1995), Mission to Mars (2000), Red Planet (2000), Apollo 18 (2011), Alien (1979), Aliens (1986), Prometheus (2012).

Orbiting Earth on a research space station, six astronauts intercept a vessel containing proof of life on Mars: a dormant, flagellate, single-celled organism.  They quarantine the life form, provide nutrients, and watch it grow in a controlled environment.  But its metamorphosis finds nothing like the “single-celled” organisms we know on Earth and the term “controlled environment” never seems to go as planned in these movies, does it?

Life (2017) features a premise we’ve obviously seen before.  There’s a major discovery of life beyond our solar system, something goes wrong, and a crew with good intentions is trapped with some sort of alien organism driven to kill them.  Whereas past movies took us deeper into space or on planetary surfaces (e.g., Mission to Mars, Red Planet, Apollo 18) and others brought the discovery to Earth (Species), this is a lot more like Alien/Aliens (1979-86).  And while some are calling this sci-horror; it’s nothing at all like Event Horizon (1997)—yes, it’s scary, but not that kind of scary.  However, it certainly boasts seat-gripping suspense.  I spent much of my movie-viewing experience feeling VERY NERVOUS in an awesome way.

What’s really wonderful about this film is that the entire cast really delivered. The stakes are high, the consequences get dire, and everyone performs excellently. Each character had their own flavor, as of course they should.  Our introductions remind me of Alien (1979) and Sunshine (2007); everyone has their own impetus, or thrill, or sense of duty, or desire for discovery; all of them with their own idiosyncratic demeanors that show us who they are without relying on senselessly expository dialogue to explain them away.

Jake Gyllenhaal (Donnie Darko, Nightcrawler) plays a doctor who feels more at home in zero gravity than on an over-crowded Earth, Rebecca Ferguson (Mission Impossible Rogue Nation) is our mission commander forced to make tough protocol decisions when lives are threatened, Olga Dihovichnaya brings the compassion, sci-fi favorite Hiroyuki Sanada (Sunshine, 47 Ronin, Extant, Helix) plays the engineer and family man, Ariyon Bakare (Rogue One, Jupiter Ascending) is the xenobiologist, and Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool, The Voices, RIPD) is our down-to-Earth comic relief.

Director Daniel Espinosa (Safe House) has worked with Reynolds before and knew how to use him best—capturing his snarky charm and anxiety when appropriate.  When things get iffy Reynolds’ character is the mine shaft canary.  Reynolds has recently done some less-than-celebrated films (e.g., Self/Less, Criminal, The Captive), but his fans will love him in this (think more Deadpool, Mississippi Grind).

More than any of the human characters, the creature undergoes such development!  We, the audience, are caught up in the discovery even though we saw the trailer and know things will go horribly wrong.  So, while the creature seems almost cute at first, we keep wondering when and how the “life form” will become a “monster.”  This alien is not the communal mass of single-celled organisms you learned about in biology class, nor will many find its intelligence credible.  To that I say, get over it!  Just make the submission that this is from a world we don’t know, has cellular capabilities we don’t have, and accept that this could happen.  Once you do, this creature terrifies us as it hunts crew members.

They even gave it a name: Calvin.  Of course, they named Calvin when he was much less developed and was warmly neotonous. But the personifying nature of giving it a name (“Calvin”) makes things feel more personal (e.g., OMFG where is Calvin? Calvin got him! Calvin is in the air vents.). And speaking of intense, I feel the need to remind you that this was unnervingly thrilling!  If you’re jumpy, you’ll jump a lot. If you “never scare” like me, you’ll still get startled.  Things get creepy when Calvin gets methodical.

If you’re looking for a deep plot, you won’t find it here.  The story itself is nothing special—it’s the gift wrapping, really, for the intense thrill-ride within populated by great characters and a menacing alien force.  As such I recommend this more as a fun and thrilling ride rather than a praising its merits as a film.

The ending is GREAT.  I sort of saw it coming; but I wanted this ending and I loved its execution.  Some may roll their eyes, but this ending really draws attention to how things can go so horribly wrong and unplanned when things come down to a few survivors, a heavily compromised ship, and a deadly alien stranger.  It also brings a dark poetic justice to the title—as if it refers as much to life’s discovery as life’s own drive for preservation.

I LOVED this movie.

MY CALL:  Stan Winston (Pumpkinhead) showed us how great it can be when a creature creator helms a creature feature, and here Sandy Collora wants to do the same. I was pleased with his effort and would love to see a feature length spawn from this.  MORE Indie Reviews:  Here at MFF we occasionally do horror short film and pre-release indie film reviews on request. Among recent solicited promotions are Order of the Ram (2013; short film), Love in the Time of Monsters (2014; feature length), Interior (2014; feature length), Smothered (2014; feature length), In the Dark (2015; feature length), Trailer Talk: The Void, TRAILER TALK: Blood Money, Short Film Buzz: Burn (2016; press release), Brother (2016; short film), the indie techno-horror Other Halves (2016; feature length), and Scythe (2016; short film)

Disclaimer: This review was solicited by the filmmakers after I was issued a free digital copy for supporting their Kickstarter Campaign. However, my opinion remains unbiased as I was neither hired nor paid to produce this critical review, nor do I have an investment stake in the film.

This 18-minute short film drops us at would normally be the 70-minute mark in a 90-minute movie—basically, the final segment of a feature length film.  Our final girl is being chased through the rainy forest by a monstrous bipedal amphibious humanoid; essentially a more modernly designed Creature from the Black Lagoon.  She clearly knows what she’s dealing with already and it becomes readily apparent that all her friends (or, other people in the area who could help) are all already dead.

The acting was fine but had no line-delivery—just a woman (Lisa Roumain; Avatar) desperately running scared.  But the camera work was on point, featuring great shots of our forest setting, as well as some slow-motion boob-running for, you know, the people who just enjoy some slow-motion boob-running in a wet tank top.  What I noticed most was how water (in all forms) always appeared crisply attended.

The creature effect is a rubber monster suit, which some may want to dismiss outright just upon hearing that detail.  But it is done well and it is the very purpose of this short film!  When we first get a good look at it (4:45 on the running time), we see its reptilian eye-slip covers blink and its misshapen pupil dilates. This was absolutely not half-assed! I rewound about 5 times to watch the think blink and focus its eyes. A lot of attention was also afforded to the sounds the creature would make. I liked that. It’s all in the details.  When we see the monster again we learn more about it—it has dorsal nostrils something like a whale’s blowhole atop its head.  I thought it looked great!  Dungeons and Dragons fans, I think, will especially enjoy this monster.  It reminds me of the Sahaguin or Deep Ones, appearing as aquatic lizard men with all manner of gashes, scars, coral, hooks and bits of fishnetting adorning its scale-armored body.

The filmmakers also had some fun with the gore. I was reminded of the kitchen table butchering scene in Wrong Turn (2003) at one point, and I liked the aquatic zoological touch of having fiddler crabs scavenging en masse on a brutally gored cadaver.

This film was almost entirely composed of typical horror tropes and I don’t care. I don’t consider this a negative criticism; only an observation. Sometimes we want something formulaic yet well-made, and that’s what this is. I’d really like to see a feature length version of this. We don’t have much out there harkening back to The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)—except for, maybe, Creature (2011) or Humanoids from the Deep (1980), which I enjoyed despite their overt badness—and I feel we could use some more!  Director and creature designer Sandy Collora has done well.

MY CALL:  One of the better zombie films I’ve seen in a while, and featuring gorgeous shots and excellent characters. This is a major win and a thrilling ride, mixing the best of 28 Days Later (2002) and World War Z (2013) with a dash of Dawn of the Dead (2004) and Snowpiercer (2013).  MORE MOVIES LIKE Train to Busan:  Other recent, popular Korean horror films include I Saw the Devil (2010), Thirst (2009) and The Wailing (2016).

Who’s ready for a serious zombie film?

The premise is simple enough: “While a zombie virus breaks out in South Korea, passengers struggle to survive on the train from Seoul to Busan (—IMDB).”  It begins when, after a chemical leak from a nearby biotech facility, we witness the startling reanimation of a road-killed deer.

Director and writer Sang-ho Yeon (The Fake, The King of Pigs) gives us time to get to know our characters: a divorced businessman and his daughter (Soo-an) whom he barely knows. Their relationship is strained and she wants to return to her mother’s house.  So, the next day they board the train to Busan.  Their timing couldn’t have been better as the city was taking fire and the wave of zombies would narrowly miss the departure of their train.  Or would they…?  It appears that one bite victim got on…

In no time the infected turns, bites another, those two infect two more, and in minutes we have a little zombie apocalypse in our train car microcosm.  The incubation period for this virus is apparently only seconds, during which the body violently convulses and thrashes, complete with joint cracking sounds and spastic movements throwing back to Raimi’s deadite stylings of the 80s.  These speedy viral zombies remind me of the bum-rushing feral undead in Dawn of the Dead (2004) and 28 Days Later (2002).  And with this peril, Soo-an (Soo-an Kim; Memories of the Sword) and her father Seok-woo (Yoo Gong; Goblin) find a reason to bond: survival!

As Soo-an’s father tries to save her, she voices her sadness that he only cares for himself.  During his fight to survive, our once selfish Seok-woo becomes a better man, makes an unlikely friend and both become unlikely heroes brave fearful mobs under mass hysteria driven by the most despicable bad guy of the year!

The special effects, physical zombie-acting and stunts are on point. From the zombie deer (CGI; in the opening sequence) to the scores of World War Z-esque (2013) zombies flooding over surfaces like a twitchy deluge, the reanimated movement was perfect and unnerving.  They fall from the sky and off buildings, then scramble towards all life with their mouths slack-jawed and their dislocated limbs wildly flailing about.  The stunt men must’ve had fun with this, but also likely found challenges with the close-quarter train car combat (think Snowpiercer, but tighter like Oldboy).

Between the hyper-scrambly zombies climbing over each other like the spilled-over denizens of a kicked ant mound and the sniveling bad guy who would soullessly do anything to survive, I found myself feistily yelling at the screen about a dozen times.  This movie has its real emotional moments (especially getting heavy at the end), but it likewise has its fun thrills!

From cityscapes and train station chase scenes, to action sequences in train yards and wide angle convergences of zombie hordes, this film is gorgeously shot.  And what a gorgeous framework for a broad cast of likable characters (with even some of the minor roles being quite memorable).

I can’t sing its praises enough, but if you want even more reassuring please check out Mark’s 5 Reasons to watch this exciting approach to zombiism that’s fresher than the very flesh it infects.  It also made Mark’s 10 Best Horror films of 2016.

Now get up and go watch this movie!

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Summary:  We dig deep and answer a batch of Listener Questions that are all about horror movies.  Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers and Freddy Krueger find their way into questions about famous franchises along with The Birds and Salem’s Lot. So join us as we nitpick and defend your favorite horror icons. If you enjoy this episode, try Listener Questions or Listener Questions Strike Back.

We answer the tough questions in this podcast!  For example…

“What made Hitchcock’s birds so crazy?”

“Is Jason Voorhees more than just a zombie?”

“What was going on with that deserted hospital in Halloween II?”

“Do vampires need to plan their human-cropping more carefully?”

“Did Michael Myers pass driver’s ed?”

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MY CALL:  This is exactly the Indonesian fantasy/action B-movie Terminator honorarium you’ve been waiting for!  Enjoy.  MORE MOVIES LIKE Lady Terminator:  For more Indonesian action/fantasy madness try The Devil’s Sword (1984).

Before we start, I think it’s critical that you understand just how classy this film is.  Because director H. Tjut Djalil (as Jalil Jackson; Mystics in Bali, Dangerous Seductress, Satan’s Bed) knows how to keep things classy.  Just listen to this IMDB synopsis: “The spirit of an ancient evil queen possesses the body of a young anthropology student, who then goes on a murderous rampage.”

Just to prove he means classy business, Djalil opens the film with a tastefully clothes-on sex scene culminating in the man dying because…well…something flesh-rending was evidently going on “down there” in her nether regions.  I’m reminded of movies like Teeth (2007), Evil Clutch (1988) and The Night of Something Strange (2016)…only this little Indonesian fantasy/Sci-Fi/action film turns out to be much more complicated. You see, her next lover “defeats” her by removing an eel from her—you know—which was evidently eating the penises of her past lovers in coitus.  He then magically turns her crotch eel into a dagger (don’t ask how, he just does it like he had been doing it for years) and she is furious about it!  So, she curses him: “In 100 years I’ll have my revenge on your great-granddaughter!”

Not much of a curse is it?  It seems to me that when you curse the descendant of a descendant of a descendant of the person who wronged you, the cursed person won’t live to see it. Not a significant punishment at all, if you ask me.  So, to prepare herself for this curse she wanders into the sea to join other evil forces or something.  Perhaps if I was more educated on Indonesian mythology, this all would have made perfect sense.

100 years later Tania (Barbara Anne Constable) finds a creepy book on the Southern Sea Queen from a creepy man in a library with a creepy taxidermy display.  She informs us of her credibility with such lines as “I’m not a lady. I’m an anthropologist.” During a routine anthropological scuba-diving expedition she is teleported to an unreasonably large bed and raped by an eel, resulting in her apparent possession. Things typically don’t go well for anthropologists in horror films (e.g., Cannibal Holocaust, The Serpent and the Rainbow) do they?

Based on the ensuing events, this film clearly becomes a cautionary tale for those who would engage in unprotected anonymous sex with strangers in the 80s.  Tania emerges from the water and does her best nude T-800 walk, even turning her head like Arnold and stiffly strolling around naked until she meets some local punks and “sexes them to death” with her intrauterine eel—FYI, that part was not stolen from Terminator.

It’s as campy as it gets. We see a lot of boobs, the blood spurts are silly, and she steals a punk’s leather jacket (just like Arnie).  Now she just needs to find Sarah Conner…errrr…that long dead cursed guy’s great-granddaughter.

I’m sure we’ve firmly established the badness of this film, but here are some additional ways we know this is a bad movie:

1. During an improvised gynecological exam, a man pulls an eel from a vagina and is, in no way, shocked.
2. With no disclaimed wizardry schooling, he straightens that eel into a dagger!
3. This film was based on the Indonesian legend/Goddess The Queen of the Southern Sea. If Terminator was also based on this, I had no idea.
4. The star actress also received top billing for make-up. Two pay checks, girl!
5. This film was also released as Nasty Hunter. Nasty Hunter = CLASSY!
6. Intrauterine eel rape and eel penis-eating.
7. Topless telekinetic mediation sessions in a sleazy hotel.
   
8. Apparently simply shooting a car in an 80s B-movie results in an explosion!
9. When killing men with sex just won’t do, Tania-nator gets an automatic weapon and shoots like 10 guys in the dick just like Kung Fury’s Triceracop!
   
10. She cuts out her eyeball with a pen knife…just to wash it off!
11. Eye lasers. She shoots laser beams from her eyes!
    
12. Oh, right! A woman kills men by having sex with them…to death!

This films begins about as original as they come, but then steers right into a Terminator copycat with a skewed premise.  Warlock (1989) was also a Terminator (1984) rip-off, although a bit less overtly so.  But you know what?  I’d highly recommend this to any B-movie fan, and this is clearly on the high end of B-movie quality.

All the way to the dumbly-dialogued action-packed finale, this movie tries really hard to give you a lot. A lot of nudity, a lot of bullets, a lot of eel bites to the dick, and a lot of zany nonsense.  This is a B-movie cult favorite for a reason.