Supernatural Flick – Page 2

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: 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: 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: Aenigma

From Lucio Fulci’s latter days as a filmmaker comes Aenigma, an Argento-like revenge flick set at a women’s college in Boston, although principal photography took place in Sarajevo.

Written with Giorgio Mariuzzo, Aenigma takes the basic plot elements of a ‘prank gone wrong’ horror flick, combines it with a bare bones setting and bare bones surrealism, and spits out a movie with a superfluous main character, and a purposeful avoidance of exploitation.

At St. Mary’s College in Boston, Kathy (Milijana Zirojevic), daughter of the school’s cleaning lady, Mary (Dusica Zegarac), is being prepped for a big date by her roommate, Kim (Sophie d’Aulan), and her boyfriend, Tom (Dragan Bjelogrlic). They go through the usual 1980’s teen outfit montage trope, before Kathy is finally dolled up and ready to meet her date, the college’s athletics instructor, Fred (Riccardo Acerbi). But, all is not well. The girls at the school despise Kathy’s humble origins, and the date is a cruel prank, set up just so all the girls can gather and laugh at Kathy’s presumption that a hunk like Fred would actually like her. Kathy flees from her tormentors into the path of a truck, and is left in a coma at the hospital. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Aenigma”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Lisa and the Devil

Lisa and the Devil, the 1973 film from Italian auteur Mario Bava, has become one of his more renowned films in the last couple of decades. I first saw it around twenty years ago with a roommate who was watching it for her film class at NYU. Upon release, though, it was a butchered product, with a framing story shot and added after Bava delivered his cut. Of this film, which had been released under the title of La Casa dell’esorcismo (House of Exorcism), Bava said, “La casa dell’esorcismo is not my film, even though it bears my signature. It is the same situation, too long to explain, of a cuckolded father who finds himself with a child that is not his own, and with his name, and cannot do anything about it.”

That’s some pretty strong language. But, he wasn’t referring to the film that was eventually released as Lisa and the Devil. He was referring to a cobbled-together mess insisted upon by the film’s producer, Alfredo Leone, who wanted a whole bunch of exorcism-related material added to an already completed film in order to cash in on William Friedkin’s Exorcist. This year’s Horrorshow is not concerned with that movie.

Lisa and the Devil follows Elke Sommer as Lisa, a tourist who gets lost in the wandering, narrow streets of old Toledo, Spain. She hitches a ride from a rich, married couple, Francis and Sohpia Lehar (Eduardo Fajardo and Sylva Koscina), and their chauffeur, George (Gabriele Tinti). The Lehar’s old limo breaks down in front of a villa, and they are invited in by the Countess (Alida Valli) and her son, Max (Alessio Orano). In a bit of stunt casting, the Countess’s butler, Leandro, is played by Telly Savalas. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Lisa and the Devil”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: The Church, aka La Chiesa

After the success of Demons 2, director Lamberto Bava and producer Dario Argento had begun to collaborate on another project. But, while Bava wanted to do another entry in the Demons series, Argento did not, leading to Bava saying his farewells and Argento bringing in Michele Soavi, who had directed the second unit on a number of Argento’s films. A screenplay for the film passed through no less than eight hands, including Soavi’s. The location changed from a plane to a volcanic island and, finally, to a Gothic cathedral in the heart of a modern European city. Thus, we have The Church, from 1989. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: The Church, aka La Chiesa”

October Horrorshow: Video Demons Do Psychotown, aka Bloodbath in Psycho Town

Video Demons do Psychotown movie poster What a pair of titles. Video Demons Do Psychotown and Bloodbath in Psycho Town. Both are great titles for a sleazy drive-in horror flick featuring the three ‘B’s’ — Blood, Breasts, and Beasts. Well, there are two of those, which doesn’t make this flick a total bust, but viewers have been subjected to that all-too common feature of shitty filmmaking: the misleading title. Titles like that above promise something extreme, something visceral, something that satisfies the basest desires of the depraved horror movie fan. But, in truth, this flick is just cheap.

Distributed by Troma, mass purveyors of trash cinema, Video Demons comes to us via writer/director Alessandro De Gaetano.

Released in 1989, Video Demons follows student filmmakers Eric and Karen (Ron Arragon and Donna Baltron) as they set off into rural Indiana to make a documentary movie about a town full of psychics, hence the ‘Psychotown’[sic] of the title. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Video Demons Do Psychotown, aka Bloodbath in Psycho Town”

Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Baron Blood, aka After Elizabeth Died, aka Gli orrori del castello di Norimberga

Baron Blood, Mario Bava’s 1972 film, a joint Italian-German production, was a success, making money in both the domestic and international markets. It seemed to tick off all the audiences’ boxes for what gothic horror should be. A castle, a baron, a mysterious legend, some bodies, and a bombshell female lead. Nothing about it feels original, though. Mario Bava is one of the giants hovering over horror films, but the internet seems to agree with my reaction to Baron Blood, ranking it as one of Bava’s more pedestrian efforts. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad film. It isn’t. It just fails to leave a lasting impression.

The film follows Antonio Cantafora as Peter Kleist, the son of Austrian immigrants who has returned to the old country to explore his family’s past before returning to his studies. He is staying with his uncle, Dr. Karl Hummel (Massimo Girotti), who teaches at a local university. Continue reading “Lo spettacolo dell'orrore italiano: Baron Blood, aka After Elizabeth Died, aka Gli orrori del castello di Norimberga”