Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: A Bay of Blood, aka Ecologia del delitto, aka Twitch of the Death Nerve, or, The Real Estate Market is Cutthroat

Mario Bava was one of the greats of horror cinema. Not just Italian horror, but horror in general. Horror junkies the world over celebrate his more famous films as essential to the genre. Like with all artists, it wasn’t all smooth sailing. By the 1970s critics had begun to fall out of love with Bava, and that shows with the negative reaction to A Bay of Blood upon its release in 1971.

Contemporary critics and fans were hard on A Bay of Blood, as Bava had moved on from atmospheric gothic horror and into exploitation. Funny enough, though, this film proved to be as much an influence on later horror films as any other movie he had made. Viewers with more than a passing knowledge of American slasher flicks will see some of that subgenre’s genesis in A Bay of Blood. As such, it’s a film that garnered a much better reputation before the decade was out. Continue readingLo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: A Bay of Blood, aka Ecologia del delitto, aka Twitch of the Death Nerve, or, The Real Estate Market is Cutthroat”

October Horrorshow: The Devil’s Nightmare

At first glance, The Devil’s Nightmare looks like a shoo-in addition to the Shitty Movie Sundays Watchability Index. After a full viewing, however, I can say that it’s not. And since Missile Test is a dictatorship, my opinions have the force of law.

The main reason why one would think this is shitty is that the movie doesn’t look all that good. It doesn’t appear to have ever gotten a restoration before release to Blu-Ray, and, as of this writing, it wasn’t available on streaming. The print I saw was from a horror compilation DVD set, formatted for CRT televisions. Continue readingOctober Horrorshow: The Devil’s Nightmare”

October Horrorshow: Crucible of Horror, aka The Corpse

There is more content out there than one can possibly experience, and this was true in the days before the web, as well. That’s how an odd psychological horror flick like Crucible of Horror can become largely forgotten, its prints left to decay, its copyright allowed to lapse. The film hasn’t been completely forsaken by the entertainment biz, however. There is a fully restored Blu-Ray version out there, but most versions consist of dismally cared for prints on VHS and older DVDs, formatted for CRT televisions, and with much footage missing. The version I watched for this review had the picture and missing footage restored, but is a 1.33:1 print cropped to widescreen. Maybe someday the version used in the Blu-Ray will become available to stream, but for now this less-than-perfect version is the best streamers can get. Continue readingOctober Horrorshow: Crucible of Horror, aka The Corpse”

Shitty Movie Sundays: Chain Gang Women

We have been hornswoggled. We have been bamboozled. Hoodwinked. Swindled. Tricked, and defrauded. A movie with a title such as Chain Gang Women has obligations to be met. There needs to be women. On a chain gang. And there should be, at minimum, two nude shower scenes. A film with a title like this owes its audience genuine exploitative sleaze. This flick is that, to be sure, but to an inadequate extent. Nor does that change the fact that viewers are the victims of shameless misdirection in the pursuit of drive-in dollars. I shall explain. Continue readingShitty Movie Sundays: Chain Gang Women”

Shitty Movie Sundays: Point of Terror

Point of Terror is the final film in a career cut short. Actor/producer Peter Carpenter only has four credits on his IMDb page, and this is the last. There are conflicting stories in the tubes, but what they all agree on is that Carpenter is dead. It happened at any time between 1971, not too long after this film was released, and the early 1980s. Either way, Carpenter was poised to have a fantastic career in shitty movies, akin to that of Andrew Stevens, but it wasn’t to be. Continue readingShitty Movie Sundays: Point of Terror”

Shitty Movie Sundays: Chrome and Hot Leather

Chrome and Hot Leather walks and talks like drive-in outlaw biker gang flick, but it’s missing the two most important elements of true exploitation cinema: blood and nudity. It starts out promisingly enough, and, overall, it’s a quite enjoyable shitty movie watch, but it’s like a cake with no icing. It’s still good, but it wouldn’t be all that hard to make it better.

From way back in 1971, Chrome and Hot Leather was directed by Lee Frost, from a screenplay by Michael Haynes, David Neibel, and Don Tait. Whomever came up with the title isn’t listed in the credits, but that mysterious person certainly did more for this film’s longevity than anything that was captured on film. Perhaps it was producer Wes Bishop. No matter who is responsible, they did a nice job. Continue readingShitty Movie Sundays: Chrome and Hot Leather”

October Hammershow: Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb, or, Underboob: The Movie

Blood from the Mummy's Tomb movie posterHammer, in a wise decision, jettisoned much of the tropes they had used in their previous Mummy films. For three consecutive productions, they had made basically the same film. British archaeologists discover ancient Egyptian tomb, said tomb has a curse on it, ancient Egyptian mummy resurrects and kills those who dared desecrate the tomb. It really was the same thing again and again. That was all well and good when they did it the first time, but by the last film, The Mummy’s Shroud, the plot was too familiar, and everyone involved seemed to be just going through the paces.

The fourth film, Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb, stays true to only some of the core elements, going so far as to ditch the traditional bandages and rags of films past. In this film, written by Christopher Wicking, loosely adapting Bram Stoker’s novel The Jewel of Seven Stars, the mummy is the perfectly preserved corpse of Queen Tera, who died young and buxom, and thus couldn’t be wrapped in bandages, oh no.

Her tomb is discovered by the requisite British Egyptologists, but they bring the dead queen and her artifacts back to England in secret, rather than placing them in a museum or putting on a tour. That’s because, for reasons that are never adequately explained, some of the party wish to resurrect the queen, so she can rule again. Anyway, the resurrection part is kind of on the periphery, because in the meantime, Queen Tera has a doppelganger in Margaret Fuchs (Valerie Leon, who plays both Margaret and Tera), the daughter of the archaeological expedition’s leader, Julian Fuchs (Andrew Keir). She was born in England at the very moment Queen Tera’s sarcophagus was opened, revealing the scantily clad beauty within. Continue readingOctober Hammershow: Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb, or, Underboob: The Movie”

October Horrorshow: The Abominable Dr. Phibes

Vincent Price has been woefully underrepresented here in the Horrorshow, but partial restitution will be made today. Vincent Price may have spent much of his career far from the glitz and glam of big Hollywood, but that wasn’t because of a lack of skill as an actor.

Vincent Price was a bit of a rollicking performer. It didn’t matter how silly the role or the movie. In fact, the more absurd a project, the more Price seemed to enjoy what he was doing. Sometimes actors are the victims of typecasting, but in the case of Vincent Price, he thrived. Today’s film features one of Price’s most iconic roles — that of the hideously disfigured Dr. Anton Phibes. Continue readingOctober Horrorshow: The Abominable Dr. Phibes”

The Empty Balcony: Wake in Fright

I can get the heart of this review out of the way quickly. Wake in Fright is the best movie I have seen in at least the last couple of years. Directed by Ted Kotcheff and written by Evan Jones, Wake in Fright has an interesting history. From 1971, it was close to being a lost film for a long time, with the only known copy in existence of such poor quality that it was unfit for transfer to home media. Twenty years ago, Anthony Buckley, who edited the original film, began to search for an intact copy. After much effort, he succeeded. A restoration was finally undertaken in 2009, and the film was released to the general public once again. Continue readingThe Empty Balcony: Wake in Fright”

The Empty Balcony: Dirty Harry

Dirty HarryThe tough-nosed cop with a disdain for the rules is a staple in film. Always butting heads with desk-bound lieutenants and mayors more concerned with getting reelected than cleaning up the streets, this breed of law enforcement officer has little time for procedure or the niceties of due process. Largely a fabrication of Hollywood, this cop operates in a world where the worse the crime, the more likely the guilty will go free due to the dreaded plot device known as “technicalities.” It’s all the more galling because there is never any doubt to the audience or to the hero that the bad guy is bad. Letting the bad guy go free because his rights were violated is nothing less than a miscarriage of justice, and it’s always left up to the hero cop to right such grievous wrongs. No film comes to mind that explored these ideas more effectively than 1971’s Dirty Harry. Continue readingThe Empty Balcony: Dirty Harry”