October Horrorshow

October Horrorshow: Gargoyles

According to Gargoyles, a TV movie first broadcast on CBS in 1972, the stone gargoyles that grace gothic cathedrals and other structures are artistic interpretations of real beings — soldiers of Satan who appear every 600 years and attempt to take over the world for their evil master. Wouldn’t you know it, the gargoyles are due to appear in New Mexico in 1972, and it’s up to a college professor and his daughter to stop them.

Dr. Mercer Boley (Cornel Wilde) is a successful demonologist. Not in any occult or supernatural sense. Rather, he writes anthropological books on the origins of demonic myths throughout the world. His studies take him to Devil’s Crossing, New Mexico (location work was done in and around the area of Carlsbad Caverns). He’s joined by his daughter, Diana (Jennifer Salt), who enjoys traveling all over the world with him. Their first stop is a lonely roadside attraction run by Uncle Willie (Woodrow Chambliss), who looks like he hasn’t been around a living person in years. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Gargoyles”

October Horrorshow: The Gingerdead Man

It’s hard to fault the pitch behind The Gingerdead Man. Gary Busey plays Millard Findlemeyer, a mass murderer who, after testimony from a survivor of his attack, Sarah Leigh (Robin Sydney), is executed. His mother, a witch, claims his ashes afterwards, and mixes them into some gingerbread spice, which she then delivers in secret to the bakery owned and operated by Sarah. Some blood is inadvertently added to the mix, and when a dough is made and baked into the shape of a gingerbread man, Findlemeyer’s soul comes back to life, possesses the cookie, and goes on a murderous rampage of revenge. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: The Gingerdead Man”

October Horrorshow: Shadowzone

Charles Band and Full Moon have been major contributors to the world of b-cinema for decades. Reliable, sometimes repugnant, sometimes transcendent — a viewer will know before the opening credits are over that there will be at least one outrageous moment in a Full Moon flick, even if there is a fair amount of crap to wade through. Shadowzone, from 1990, is about as prototypical as a Full Moon movie gets. It doesn’t come close to blowing a viewer away like the uncensored version of Castle Freak, but it has none of the mind numbing crassness of an Evil Bong flick. It’s a simple, cheap horror flick, and it rips off Alien. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Shadowzone”

October Horrorshow: Lockdown Tower, aka La tour

Horror films are more than just about fear. They run the gamut of distressing emotions. Besides fear there is its more frantic cousin, panic. There is also disgust, grief, loneliness, and, of course, dread. Going beyond fear into these other realms of negative emotional experience can do a lot to rob the fun from a horror flick, but they also introduce realism and honesty into stories that, otherwise, have little more depth than a carnival funhouse. Today’s film dips far into a reservoir of hopelessness, so much so that the experience will linger in a viewer’s mind after the credits roll. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Lockdown Tower, aka La tour”

October Horrorshow: The Beast Within

In 1964, newlyweds from Jackson, Mississippi, Eli and Caroline MacCleary (Ronny Cox and Bibi Besch), are traveling through lonely Nioba County on a dark night during their honeymoon. A flat tire leaves their car beached on the side of the road, and Eli has to walk to a gas station to get a tow. Caroline stays behind, with no more than a locked car door and a dog to protect her. Out of the woods lumbers a humanoid monster that kills the dog and attacks Caroline. While she lays unconscious in the mud and dead leaves, the monster rapes her, and wanders off again before Eli and the tow truck driver return. They discover her, bruised and battered, carry her to the truck, and drive off in search of aid. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: The Beast Within”

October Horrorshow: When Evil Lurks, aka Cuando acecha la maldad

From writer/director Demián Rugna comes When Evil Lurks, a kind of dystopian tale, wherein the suffocating threat to humanity is not its own devices, but rather demonic possession.

One night, brothers Pedro and Jimi (Ezequiel Rodríguez and Demián Salomón), hear gunshots in the woods near the family farm in rural Argentina. When they investigate the next morning, they find the mutilated remains of a ‘cleaner,’ a person employed by the government to carry out occult executions of ‘rottens,’ or individuals possessed by demons.

Rottens are an ever-present problem in this film’s universe. Apparently, the charlatanism of organized religion was finally too much for the lord, and churches lost their power to battle evil. Now possession is something of an infectious disease that can spread through a community. The cleaner that Pedro and Jimi found in the woods was on the way to kill a rotten in a neighboring farm. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: When Evil Lurks, aka Cuando acecha la maldad”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Paganini Horror

Happy Halloween, folks. We come to the end of another glorious month of blood, gore, supernatural threats, silly plots, and fun. Early on in preparation for The Italian Horrorshow, I was focused on the big names and the big titles from Europe’s boot. But, it didn’t take long to regress to the mean. This site’s bread and butter is bad cinema, and the final film of the Horrorshow reflects that. Oh, boy, does it.

From writer/director Luigi Cozzi comes Paganini Horror, a story about a pop band that gets more than they bargained for when they use a previously unknown composition by famed violinist and composer Niccolò Paganini as the basis for their new song. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Paganini Horror”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Metamorphosis (1990), aka Regenerator, aka DNA formula letale

George Eastman, aka Luigi Montefiori, is one of the legends of Shitty Movie Sundays. His long career as an actor and writer spanned six decades before he hung them up in 2010. He’s worked with some of the giants of Italian cinema, including Mario Bava and Lina Wertmüller. He had a long professional collaboration with schlock director Joe D’Amato. He’s acted in, and written, spaghetti westerns, crime flicks, giallo, horror, post-apocalyptic sci-fi, and smut (although I don’t think he’s ever taken his pants off in one — I could be wrong). His face has been a constant presence in the types of movies featured in Shitty Movie Sundays, but he only has one solo directing credit in his oeuvre — Metamorphosis (Italian: DNA lethal formula), from 1990. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Metamorphosis (1990), aka Regenerator, aka DNA formula letale”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Witchery, aka La Casa 4 – Witchcraft, aka Witchcraft (Evil Encounters)

More Italian title trickery! Upon release in Italy, this morning’s film was titled La Casa 4 – Witchcraft, a sequel in name only to La Casa 3 – Ghosthouse. It’s an unfortunately common thing overseas, not just in Italy, for movies to be marketed as a sequel to an unrelated film. Most of the time, we don’t have to deal with that shit here in the States, so we were given the simple title Witchery, although the print I saw used the title for the film’s release in Australia, Witchcraft (Evil Encounters). How silly the business of movies can be.

The good news is, Witchery stars Linda Blair and David Hasselhoff. I’ll repeat that. Linda Blair, adorable teen star of The Exorcist turned prolific b-movie actress, and The Hoff. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Witchery, aka La Casa 4 – Witchcraft, aka Witchcraft (Evil Encounters)”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Body Count (1986), aka Camping del terrore

This is the third film from director Ruggero Deodato to be featured in the Italian Horrorshow, after the unforgettable pair of Cannibal Holocaust and Jungle Holocaust. Both of those films were impressive in their storytelling and shocking visuals. Deodato must have had enough of cannibals after that, and instead turned his talents to an American-style slasher/cabin in the woods flick.

Written by many people, including Italian cinema stalwarts Sheila Goldberg and Dardano Sacchetti, Body Count (Italian: Terror camping) tells the story of two groups of youths that are brought together by chance, to be chased around a derelict campground by a masked killer. Anyone with even a passing familiarity with horror flicks will have seen this plot, or something damned close, once or twice. This being the fifteenth year of the Horrorshow, on top of a lifetime of watching horror flicks, I figured there would be nothing all that special about this flick. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Body Count (1986), aka Camping del terrore”