The world of exploitation film ripped open and laid raw for you to experience. From 70's grindhouse to current underground, it is all here. So ripe you can practically smell it.
THE HANGING WOMAN (1971) aka TERROR OF THE LIVING DEAD aka RETURN OF THE ZOMBIES aka ORGY OF THE DEAD D. Jose Louis Merino TROMA DVD FULL FRAME
I have a special love for Paul Naschy and his films. In 2007 when the BCI releases came out I introduced his work to a very dear friend of mine that I unfortunately do not get to see often. The two of us came to love watching Naschy's movies together and over the years since it has become something we do together. Life has it's way of making things difficult and time has not allowed us to watch more of his movies since we looked at HOUSE OF PSYCHOTIC WOMEN near the beginning of this year. As part of my Halloween Horror Challenge I decided to look at THE HANGING WOMAN, released by Troma. I really wish my friend had been here for it.
THE HANGING WOMAN is clearly not one of Naschy's better vehicles. In fact he is only in it sporadically playing IGOR the local gravedigger with a penchant for kissing up the sleeping bosoms of maidens and touching up the corpse of his dead girl. The real plot deals with Serge (Stelvio Rosi) a count who has come to a sleepy town to claim the mansion left behind by his dead Uncle. He finds a house full of insanity with Uncle's former partner and his daughter conducting electric experiments on dead tissue in hopes of resurrection. Also living there is his Uncle's mistress who wants only to sell the mansion and get her mega-bucks. Serge fucks his way through the female cast while trying to figure out what is going on. Along the way the Doctor's daughter is found hanging in the graveyard, but she clearly did not die by her own hand. Eventually all roads lead to the fact his Uncle is still walking around killing.
The movie has a leaden pace that only livens up during the psychedelically shot sex scenes, and the few and far between gore scenes. The climax with the living dead is thankfully very effective with some incredible make up. Naschy is in the climactic scenes the most, so fans of the man have to wait to see him in action. The TROMA DVD is the most complete version of the movie possible, but it still looks like shit. While it is clearly cut together from several prints but not much remastering seems to have been done. Thankfully they went buck wild with the extras with a commentary, a bunch of interesting featurettes, trailers and a great spot on dubbing in Spain by Art Ettinger and Mike Maggot.
This recent release from the insane (or
is it inane) folks at TROMA seeks to tame the balance between horror
and comedy once again, between camp and clowning around, between gore
and balloon animals. The results are a game changer, the kind of film
that redefines the genre. That looks at the rules of genre and
decides that it is time to totally do away with them and start over
fresh. You've never seen a movie like KLOWN KAMP MASSACE and more
than likely never will again.
The movie opens with a psycho Clown
named Edward at Clown college going on a killing spree. The is being
recorded. Jump forward a few years and the local clown camp is being
re-opened, complete with a group of misfit, knuckle heads who hope to
make it big as clowns. But psycho Edward is still running around the
camp doing people in.
The movie uses the expected iconography
of the slasher genre and deconstructs it using the comedy elements,
fusing it with clown jokes and costumes, causing it all to be a
juxtaposition of styles. By doing so this becomes a celebration of
not only the horror film of which it constantly looks back at the
audience with a wink and a grin, but of the idea of the scary clown
but giving us those clowns as victims. Obviously the whole point of
the movie is to say to the average horror fan that “Your
expectations are too high, so we aim to shoot lower and keep those
expectations in place. It is as if the filmmakers where looking at
the horror fandom itself and saying “ Look we see that you think
you are cooler than this material, but you really aren't not. We see
what has come before and we have digested that and made this from all
that has come before. All you fans with high and mighty expectations
can just go get fucked because this is just us having fun. But
completely restoring faith in the genre is the process.” The sting
in the tail of the movie makes the while thing end up be oh so “meta”
as it folds in on itself and changes once again.
In all honestly the movie ends up
becoming a little bit charming, with a couple of jokes that work
including the ICP kid, and a couple of fake commercials in the final
moments.
I actually Watched KLOWN KAMP
MASSACRE after coming home from seeing CABIN IN THE WOODS a movie I
really did not care for. The reaction to CABIN online has been
overwrought at best with fans and critics falling to their knees in
praise. This entire review of KKM is made of of actual hyperbole
from online posts and reviews for CABIN but when applied to another
movie not associated to a filmmaker with a set godlike status
hopefully people can see how insane this stuff sounds.
PSYCHO
SLEEPOVER (2008) D. Adam Deyoe, Eric Gosselin TROMA S.O.V.
This
movie starts off strong with some genuinely funny banter between a
guy and his girlfriend Ginny(Emilia
Richeson) about how far their relationship has reached. She is
all about the Eskimo kisses and he wants a blow job. There is some
witty and knowing dialogue about how they are 15 and 17 years old
even though the actors both clearly look to be in their late twenty’s
(a nice gesture since these kinds of movies always cast people too
old to be teenagers). Felicia Rose appears on TV as a newscaster
mentioning a maniac killer loose in the neighborhood. Soon their
argument reaches heated proportions and she leaves the room only to
hear the doorbell. When she returns her dumbass boyfriend is no
where to be scene but a maniac clown is at the door. A struggle
ensues with some funny gags along the way that ends with her leading
him to a long stair case outside. Cue a funny pratfall down those
stairs and her dispatching him.
This opening is shockingly funny, with
some witty dialogue, fun performances and a very knowing wink to the
audience that they know what they are getting. Granted the movie is
cheap looking, but it is forgivable because it seems like we are in
for something fun.
Then the movie starts proper and there are signs that
things may be rotten are afoot. The first sign is that the gaggle of
teen girls that are her friends has one of them played by a
overweight guy in drag. You can either look at this as a homage to
John Waters or just an act of desperation. I'm voting for
desperation. Ginny's friends invite her over for a sleepover in hopes
of getting her hooked up with a nice guy since she killed her last
boyfriend. Turns out her dad was killed by a serial killer too. Once
Home from school the doctor from the loony bin comes by to check on
her, instead trying to get into her pants. The neighborhood nerds
are all excited to peep in the sleepover because they “might to get
see boobs and finally get to have a boner.”
At the loony bin
the Doctor brags that he is going to go get busy with Ginny at the
sleepover and blabs the address. Then leaves the door unlocked to the
place and all the serial killers and crazies wonder out into the
streets to start killing people. They be-line to where the sleep over
is. Of course the doctor was given a false address so some innocent
people are killed along the way.
The movie is tolerable, but just silly
until the boyfriends show up, then it just plows into stupidsville
headfirst. Pretty much from this point on out the movie is just dumb
jokes that wouldn't hit if you threw them against the wall. Silly sex
jokes where they are clearly not having any kind of sex, juvenile
gross out antics that are annoying instead of funny. The opening that
seemed aware of genre conventions seems to get tossed out the window
in favor of a kitchen sink approach of any possible joke just to see
if it could work. The tedium of unfunny to funny wears out its
welcome. By the time you get to a moment that does work you really
have stopped caring.
There is a major plot twist by the later
third when it turns out the girls running the sleepover are actually
psychopaths themselves who lure guys over to kill them for fun. So
outside are dozens of loons trying to get in, the girls inside are
crazy too. The only normal people are Ginny and the virgin Peeping
Tom Nerds. It all climaxes to a huge free for all blood bath that is
more tedious than fun. Though to be fair the movie finally has some
nudity from no name extras who come out of nowhere to play topless
psychopath extras. So finally a movie about a sleepover gives a
smidgen of naked flesh.
Ultimately PSYCHO SLEEPOVER is a
resounding failure, which is a shame, because it started off so
strong.
The DVD includes a commentary,
outtakes, deleted scenes and several behind the scenes featurettes.
So have fun with that stuff!!!
KILLER YACHT PARTY (2010)
D. Piotr Uzarowicz
TROMA
1.78 non-anamorphic
From the name of the director of this flick you would assume you are getting some foreign slasher action. But the first ten minutes are some L.A. hipster insider look at the club scene. Sort of a how to get into a sleaze club and how it works from the inside. That should be the first sign you have been had. Two fresh on the streets of L.A chicks hit the scene trying to party, one "hot" blonde named Lacee and her "plain" friend named appropriately enough Jane. We see how to pay off the door man, how to let the owner of the club grope you for drinks, how the hot guys deal drugs and how it just doesn't fuckin pay to be plain cause in L.A. that means you are a "dog" and you wont get in free anywhere. Somehow the babe still get invited the Yacht party the next day where some dude who looks like a reject from the TWILIGHT Movies is hanging around the sideline obviously waiting to do something nefarious. Not to mention the really pissed off Gen-X drug dealers that were thrown out of the club who are gonna have to get some action of their own. Could be a KILLER YACHT PARTY.OH SHIT!!!
So the whole interchangeable cast end up out on the water on the yacht we later find out is supposedly haunted by the ghost of its owner that was killed in some insurance scam. We get an interminable amount of walking down hallways, partying down, and conversations to convince us that Jane is oh so plain and not compatible because she does things like read books and doesn't want to be int he spotlight. A weird thing is that the movie is chocked full of L.A. styled bimbos but none of them take their clothes off or do their duty to fill the movie with skin and sin. The movie takes itself way too seriously, never committing to being the exploitation movie that it really is. The one very brief nude scene has the gal sitting on the toilet for crying out loud. Well maybe some Troma fans are into that type of thing...
"Oh bitch you is so damn Plain! Your name is probably Jane! see this movie is clever like that!"
One last thought. The final reveal on who the killer is would actually be kind of offensive if the movie around it was better made, but here it is not a surprise at all and just lame.
This extremely low budget shot on video action flick has a lot going for it. The story has a nice bit of social satire, the violence is splashy and nasty and even the acting is above average for a movie of this type. The movie is way rough around the edges of course but any movie that proudly boasts during the end credits that it was shot for $2500 is going to be. For a movie I went into completely blind, I was pleasantly surprised by GRIM, and even more so because of the embarrassing hard sell that TROMA is using on the dvd packaging and promotional marterials that tried to make it look like some ultra-gory, alternative/underground gore piece, which it isn’t. I was pleased to get instead a fun action movie with a bit of social satire.
The movie opens like a million other revenge tinged action films. With a multiple murder by a group of extremly unpleasant villians. These guys drive a man, woman and twelve year old boy out in the middle of nowhere. To which they proceed to beat the man to a pulp with a pipe and wrench infront of his family and execute him. The mother folows suit but they inexplicably leave the boy, though they do konk him on the head. Figuring his extreme terror will leave him mum about the proceedings. He is found by a kind man who spends the next nine years raising him. During that time he teaches him to use weapons as well.
Years later we find out this man used to be the Sheriff of the town and that he was forced to kill his own son when he joined the gang of the men who killed our hero’s family. This is where we get some important background information that sets the movie apart. Turns out the movie is taking place slightly in the future where an economic collapse has occurred due to continued bail outs to Wall Street and corporations by the government. Seems the people marched on Washington and many were killed in the ensuing riots. So much of the United States broke off into Tea Party styled militia groups who simply took over and emancipated themselves. But naturally this lead to dictatorships, chaos and social discord. The story we are watching takes place in Texas where one such faction has taken over. Our hero Nicholas Grim will now set forth into their clutches to find those who killed his family.
Along the way he will meet up with a shanty town ghetto of Mexican immigrants who will befriend him, as well a lot of bloodshed. There will be barnyard bare-chested fights, brothels, pick up trucks full of dead bodies, strangling, finger nails pulled out, bloody shootings that look more like SHOGUN ASSASSION style blood spray and lots of speeches about ones place in the role of society.
All in all GRIM is surprisingly ambitious, with a lot more on its mind that the last dozen Steven Seagal movies rolled into one. Sure the dialogue falls into preaching and speechafying more often than not, but that is to be forgiven just because at least the characters are talking ABOUT something, instead of just posing. There are even a few fight/action scenes that are well handled, especially that barn barefist fight scene.
Where GRIM fall on its face is the technical side. Apparently director Adrian Santiago has taken a page from the Robert Rodriguiz playbook and done literally everything himself. Literally directing, writing, editing, and shooting the project. The problem is that the cinematography ranges from acceptible to downright terrible depending on the scene. The scene where the whole back story of the USA collapse has the worse camera work I have seen in a legitimately released movie possibly ever. There is no reason that couldn’t have been reshot as it is horrible and distracting. The editing is also not up to par. It is never terrible, but when it gets to where thigns need to be exciting, the editing is simply not keeping up the pace. So perhaps on the next project Santiago will be able to afford some collaborators in those departments.
The DVD is typical TROMA with a completely useless intro by Lloyd Kauffman (does ANYONE even watch those anymore?) and a raft of Troma extras that have jack and shit to do with the movie including an embarrassing clip of Lloyd watching some home video footage of one of his (now former) employees at Cannes pissing in another employees luggage while they discuss it endlessly. Yawn. And a rather cute “Tromette” talking about Chaucer and showing her boobs. Yawn again. Santiago has a commentary but I didn’t listen to it yet. Perhaps I will.
I will say TROMA did a nice job with the painted cover art on this package. It reminds me of the work of Steven Romano and his book SHOCK FESTIVAL which I am sure was intentional. But I seriously could do without the tag line “The Most Fucked Up Film of the year” on the back. It isn’t even close and really is only selling this to the “hardcore” crowd and fifteen year olds.
But I say check it out if you get the chance, rude, crude and rough around the edges, there is still a good deal to like about this GRIM outing.
THERE’S NOTHING OUT THERE (1992)
D. Rolfe Kanefsky TROMA
16mm Full Frame
I first encountered this over the top home spun horror comedy many years ago when it played the Drexel 24 hour horror movie marathon in Columbus Ohio in I believe 1992 or 1993. I absolutely HATED it. The audience there LOVED it. It went over like gangbusters, but I thought it was juvenile and forced and wanted nothing to do with it or the goofy humor it contained.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that my reaction said more about me than the film I had just seen. In the following years the horror genre would change drastically for the worse, with tons of lame self referential comedies becoming the norm in the wake of Wes Craven’s and Kevin Williamson’s SCREAM movies. The actual “horror” of the movies consistently taking a back seat to jokes and refernces about how the films intrude on real life and vise versa. A wink and a nod hipster look at the genre and why it is not really scary to begin with.
I on the other hand was a hard core horror movie buff who like it straight up and ice cold. Movies like that in those days pissed me off (though SCREAM got a slight pass with me until it spawned all the imitators and sequels.) I didn’t like horror comedies because I could see the writing on the wall and it didn’t look good. That horror was quickly becoming another dirty word and as long as there were laughs it was all okay.
But what I missed was that THERE’S SOMETHING OUT THERE was a relatively clever and quick witted little monster mash that more than lives up to its sleazy little promise. First time director Rolfe Kanefsky obviously loves the genre as much as I do because he packs in so much detail in the movie that it feels like it may have been his last project ever. It actually wasn’t as he went on to direct plenty of sleazy little movies from there on out. But it is his first movie that shows he had his heart in the right place.
Recently re-released from TROMA in a mega two disc package this movie may finally find the audience that has never quite copped to it until now. Cause this little flick has it all. A little green alien that shoots lasers out of its eyes, lots of slime, tons of naked girls and at least one really nasty decapitation that should go down into the books. Then there is the jokes, fast furious and actually pretty funny, this is one of those rare horror comedies that actually is smart enough to look at itself and the genre as a whole and know what is actually funny. But is never mean or spiteful enough to insult the audience.
The plot details a group of semi obnoxious teens who head out into the woods to one of their parent’s cottages for some sprint time rest and relaxation. Naturally the one single guy turns out the be the group horror fanatic and continues to tell them consistently that they are all doomed from the start because the whole situation reeks of a bad horror film. But he is right because earlier a meteor had fallen setting loose a little green alien that looks a lot like if Belial from BASKET CASE was from outer space. This little space turd begins bumping off the fellas and they soon figure out wants to mate with the ladies (including our leading lady who looks rather foxy in her stars and stripes bikini she sports for most of the running time).
That is pretty much it. Cat and mouse, lots of goofing around with a monster (that they figure out hates shaving cream in the mouth) and tons of girls taking off their clothes. Punctuated by tons of fun dialogue and a fashion sense that hadn’t yet let go of the 80’s.
I was obviously just a very angry young man when I first saw it because it is a very charming piece of work that has only gotten better with age.
The TROMA special edition includes several commentaries with the director, one older one from a few years back and a newer one specially recorded for this disc. It also has tons of audition footage, rehearsals, outtakes and other stuff where you get to see the cast and crew cutting up. Most fun is the director’s couple of short films including a cute little (not) fetish film called MOOD BOOBS about a gal who accidentally wishes her breasts could change sizes at will. So they end up inflating and deflating when she gets angry, excited or moody. It is clearly a little fetish piece for those who have the breast inflation Jones. But it is also a cute and funny little short comedy. There is a full disclosure behind the scenes peek at the making of this one as well.
Unfortunately this has the typical TROMA intro by Lloyd Kaffman that can be skipped over. It also has the typical TROMA crappy DVD authoring, where on the second disc you can’t navigate backwards through the extras. Once you click past them, you have to follow the entire sequence to come around full circle to get to it again. Lame.
Still there is a lot of material packed on for such a small movie that most have never heard of. So for the few fans this movie has this is a great release, and should get some new fans going as well.
The Burril Family have been trying to launch the Chainsaw Sally character into becoming a horror icon for the better part of ten years now. I remember seeing them at Cinema Wasteland as far back as 2001 selling T-Shirts when there was no movie yet, just the rather striking image ofApril Monique Burrilas the title Character being all they were banking on. The whole shabang being to push a franchisable horror character, with or without major material, didn’t seem to be the point. The point was that she was sexy, fierce, and all the things that adolescent male horror fans should want in their stew.
The movie finally came out in 2005 on DVD and didn’t make too big a splash but did alright as far as these direct to DVD things go. As far as I can tell the character of Chainsaw Sallyherself has a huge fanbase online with her various facebook pages overflowing with thousands of fans. But something tells me that most of them never picked up the dvd. Once again the key here is the image of Chainsaw Sally herself, something carefully sculpted by the husband and wife team and sold incredibly well through Jimmy O’s amazing photography and art design. The couple’s online presentations, the artwork, photography, painitings etc. are second to none.
So all of that sets the bar incredibly high for the actual CHAINSAW SALLY SHOWwhich is hitting DVD from Troma home video. An impossibly high bar to achieve unfortunately which may leave a lot of fans of the online stuff feeling like they are not getting quite the ride they felt they would. By y no means is bad, the show is swiftly directed and shot, the editing crisp, clean and always reminding you it could really play on say MTV without a problem. The biggest issue is that the material is stretched out to be a TV (or was it a web series I am not sure) when it could have easily just served as one longer movie. Repetition becomes the order of the day, with some meandering plot threads and conversations that don’t really receal much at all.
But the positives, the show always looks good, and April Monique Burrilalways has a handle on the character of Chansaw Sally. After ten years it is clear she has no problem slipping right in and playing her up. On this disc is ten episodes and on longer not quite a movie. While I wouldn’t call it character growth, you can at least see a consistency of the character throughout it all. She toys with the audience and her victims all at once, obviously relishing the chance to be on screen. Which is something else to be said for the whole project. Her director and husband Jimmy O Burril uses his camera to fetishize his wife in almost every single scene she is in. While some viewers might find that annoying, I find it refreshing in this day and age. They remind me of another cult film couple I adore,Jess Franco and Lina Romay. To mine eyes I can’t help but to wonder if in making this series and putting April front and center in such a clearly sexually idolized way isn’t playing out some personal fantasies for them. For that I so go for it.
The story of the show never really progresses as much though. Sally is hiding in a small town with her grown up but sexually deviant brother Ruby . By day she is the shy Librarian but at night she goes around killing the people in town she feels are not nice folks. People who do things like fuck sheep, or are mean to her best friend, a teenage girl who works with her. Hot on Sally’s tail is a Cowboy (Bill Price clearly based on Dennis Hopper from TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2) and a busty/gorgeous cosmetic sales person (Jordan Wyandt) who talks a lot and never does much of anything.
But Sally and her Brother also take several people prisoner for personal sexual toys, eat several people, and torture a couple of teenage girls to death in highly sexualized ways. So her “code of ethics” is highly debatable at best. When she is admonishing a redneck for raping a sheep before killing him it is hard to feel she means it when she has a teenage girl scout in a dog cage at her house with an electro shock collar on that she uses for various sexual escapades (off screen of course). There is a lot of talk about her morality, but then the show dips into highly questionable stuff often clearly to give the “goods” to the audience. So it is odd bed fellows at best. Her code is never as successful as that other TV serial killer DEXTER who seems to be learning as he goes and adapting.
Maybe that is the problem here. There is not enough attention being paid to the characters and character development and way too much attention being paid to what the fans are expecting and wanting for this to work as a TV show. TV hinges on things developing as the episodes move along. Here each episodes strives to give you more kills, a little more skin (around episode 7 or 8 Sally finally does a breif nude scene) and sicker situations. But not enough meat on the bones of the story. What does develop is a really weird sense of bizare sexuality as the characters do more weirdo stuff to people. From torturing a teen girl by forcing her to pee in a bottle and when it fills the weight triggers a blade to cut off her head, to another teen girl who gets her “tittie caught in a bear trap” and that girl scout I mentioned earlier. What makes all of it so weird is all the victims are supposed to be around 15/16 years old and playing out these clearly fetishised BDSM/ stalk and slash scenerios. Is it intentional to make the audience squirm? To make the villians look that much more evil? Or was it not noticed by the filmmakers in an attempt to get to the next set piece? Something more intentional? Who knows.
So overall if you are a fan of low budget franchise driven horror/slasher stuff, you may like this. It delivers the blood and guts for sure. The lead character is solid and certainly is exactly who they set out to create. I just wish there was more going on in the script department to make it feel like there was more weight to it. After watching the whole thing in one long marathon it strikes me the Chainsaw Sally character would be more at home in a Horror host situation. Maybe a Max Headroom for the horror set. A Chainsaw Sally Talk show where she ends up having to kill the guests. That could be very interesting.
