Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
From the classic story of the same name by Robert Sheckley.
What was the last movie you saw?
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From the classic story of the same name by Robert Sheckley.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Terror of Frankenstein AKA Victor Frankenstein (1977)
Faithful adaptation of Mary Shelley’s classic novel. It keeps the flashback-within-a-flashback structure. (Frankenstein tells his story to the ship’s captain in the Arctic, the monster tells his story to Frankenstein.) Frankenstein is a young student, the monster is articulate, etc.
Handsomely filmed on a modest budget, so that it often seems like a made-for-TV adaptation of a Jane Austen novel.
The monster’s makeup is minimal; he seems more like a weird-looking guy (pasty skin, black lips, some scars) than a terrifying creature.
Don’t expect a horror movie, but more of a dark drama. I liked it.
Faithful adaptation of Mary Shelley’s classic novel. It keeps the flashback-within-a-flashback structure. (Frankenstein tells his story to the ship’s captain in the Arctic, the monster tells his story to Frankenstein.) Frankenstein is a young student, the monster is articulate, etc.
Handsomely filmed on a modest budget, so that it often seems like a made-for-TV adaptation of a Jane Austen novel.
The monster’s makeup is minimal; he seems more like a weird-looking guy (pasty skin, black lips, some scars) than a terrifying creature.
Don’t expect a horror movie, but more of a dark drama. I liked it.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Beware My Brethren AKA The Fiend (1972)
Starts with a fire-and-brimstone preacher (Patrrick Magee) shouting at his tiny congregation during the baptism of a child, with the congregation shouting back just as fervently. This scene is intercut with a young woman being chased and eventually murdered by an unseen somebody. There's also the first of a few really professional rock/pop/gospel songs, supposedly sung by one of the members of the cult. There's one person playing an organ, but we hear drums, guitars, etc.
This set the mood for the whole film. The killer is the son of a woman who provides room in her house for the preacher's miniature church. He's a part-time security guard (wearing an all-black, helmeted uniform that would have been rejected by the Third Reich as too fascist) and part-time something-or-other at a public pool. This gives him the chance to shout at a young woman who unties her bikini top to tan her back. Amazingly, she later accepts a ride from from him. Yep, she's the next victim.
Our killer records his murders on audiotape, playing them simultaneously with recorded sermons from an Arizona-based preacher, of which the local sect is apparently an offshoot.
This guy could give lessons in How To Pick Up Girls. He later meets another young woman outside a movie theater, gets her to go with him when her boyfriend fails to show up, and she quickly suggests a nighttime swim at the public pool, stripping down to her knickers and smooching on him right away. Yep, she's the next victim.
Complications ensue when two sisters show up, one a visiting nurse giving Mom her insulin injections (secretly, as medical care is forbidden by the preacher), the other an investigative reporter trying to get the goods on the sect. Let's just say that the preacher's insistence that insulin-dependent Mom go on a seven-day fast for her sins leads to an over-the-top ending.
I'll just note that sleazy British sex-and-violence shockers like this generally feature much better acting than their American equivalents.
Starts with a fire-and-brimstone preacher (Patrrick Magee) shouting at his tiny congregation during the baptism of a child, with the congregation shouting back just as fervently. This scene is intercut with a young woman being chased and eventually murdered by an unseen somebody. There's also the first of a few really professional rock/pop/gospel songs, supposedly sung by one of the members of the cult. There's one person playing an organ, but we hear drums, guitars, etc.
This set the mood for the whole film. The killer is the son of a woman who provides room in her house for the preacher's miniature church. He's a part-time security guard (wearing an all-black, helmeted uniform that would have been rejected by the Third Reich as too fascist) and part-time something-or-other at a public pool. This gives him the chance to shout at a young woman who unties her bikini top to tan her back. Amazingly, she later accepts a ride from from him. Yep, she's the next victim.
Our killer records his murders on audiotape, playing them simultaneously with recorded sermons from an Arizona-based preacher, of which the local sect is apparently an offshoot.
This guy could give lessons in How To Pick Up Girls. He later meets another young woman outside a movie theater, gets her to go with him when her boyfriend fails to show up, and she quickly suggests a nighttime swim at the public pool, stripping down to her knickers and smooching on him right away. Yep, she's the next victim.
Complications ensue when two sisters show up, one a visiting nurse giving Mom her insulin injections (secretly, as medical care is forbidden by the preacher), the other an investigative reporter trying to get the goods on the sect. Let's just say that the preacher's insistence that insulin-dependent Mom go on a seven-day fast for her sins leads to an over-the-top ending.
I'll just note that sleazy British sex-and-violence shockers like this generally feature much better acting than their American equivalents.
alexvss
Me doesn't knows no grammar.
Sonatine (1993). Tokyo gangsters travel to Okinawa to help allies that are waging war with a rival clan.
It’s written, directed, edited and starred by legendary comedian Takeshi Kitano, who also directed Hanabi (1997), which is pretty similar but with a cop. He also directed an installment of the blind samurai Zatoichi back in 2003, which I haven’t seen yet. Sonatine is also the third installment in a trilogy, but I’ve never seen the other two (Violent Cop and Boiling Point).
Experimental and subversive, it’s the first Yakuza movie without katanas that I’ve ever seen. It’s nihilistic, and it depicts violence as being something as natural as breathing. When someone is killed, the people around just make these blank faces, and then they move on. And that makes sense because it’s on par with the rest of the movie. Kitano did something similar in the live action version of Ghost in the Shell, and it didn’t work. The rest of the cast was on another vibe.
Sonatine also makes fun of the Yakuza by putting them in a lot of silly situations, specially in the second act. The sumo fighting scene is the best example of that:
I don’t know the meaning of the title for sure, but I think that the theme song has something to do with it. It reminded me of John Carpenter’s Halloween theme song.
And, just out of curiosity, the Brazilian title of this movie couldn’t be more idiotic: Maximum Adrenaline. It’s not the funniest translated title in Brazil (you’d be amazed with what we can do) but it’s probably the one that's the furthest away from the movie’s premise.
Highly recommended.
It’s written, directed, edited and starred by legendary comedian Takeshi Kitano, who also directed Hanabi (1997), which is pretty similar but with a cop. He also directed an installment of the blind samurai Zatoichi back in 2003, which I haven’t seen yet. Sonatine is also the third installment in a trilogy, but I’ve never seen the other two (Violent Cop and Boiling Point).
Experimental and subversive, it’s the first Yakuza movie without katanas that I’ve ever seen. It’s nihilistic, and it depicts violence as being something as natural as breathing. When someone is killed, the people around just make these blank faces, and then they move on. And that makes sense because it’s on par with the rest of the movie. Kitano did something similar in the live action version of Ghost in the Shell, and it didn’t work. The rest of the cast was on another vibe.
Sonatine also makes fun of the Yakuza by putting them in a lot of silly situations, specially in the second act. The sumo fighting scene is the best example of that:
I don’t know the meaning of the title for sure, but I think that the theme song has something to do with it. It reminded me of John Carpenter’s Halloween theme song.
And, just out of curiosity, the Brazilian title of this movie couldn’t be more idiotic: Maximum Adrenaline. It’s not the funniest translated title in Brazil (you’d be amazed with what we can do) but it’s probably the one that's the furthest away from the movie’s premise.
Highly recommended.
Jeffbert
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Evil Under the Sun (1982) I almost turned it off, after 20 minutes, as it was rather slow. If not for his voice, I would not have recognized that Odell Gardener was portrayed by James Mason! He was very old.
So, there is this exclusive island resort where the rich people go to avoid the commoners; Hercule Poirot (Peter Ustinov) just happens to be there. A woman is murdered by strangulation, & HC pieces together the murderer's tactics to keep himself from being found-out.
Once the initial 20 minutes passed, the film became tolerable, but once is enough.
7/10
So, there is this exclusive island resort where the rich people go to avoid the commoners; Hercule Poirot (Peter Ustinov) just happens to be there. A woman is murdered by strangulation, & HC pieces together the murderer's tactics to keep himself from being found-out.
Once the initial 20 minutes passed, the film became tolerable, but once is enough.
7/10
Jeffbert
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Split Second (1953) NOIR ALLEY, & the story behind this film was as interesting as the film itself. Escaped convicts hide-out in a nuclear bomb test site, but take hostages with them. Muller said this was essentially a version of The Petrified Forest, in a setting of a nuclear test site. While the opening details Muller provided were interesting, the closing ones were even more interesting. Director Dick Powell, better known for song & dance, then tough Noir characters directed this film in California, but would later direct The Conqueror too close to an actual nuclear test site. nearly half the crew and cast eventually succumbed to cancer, including John Wayne & Powell himself. But there is more: Muller said he rarely misses a chance to talk about actor Paul Kelly, who had been convicted of manslaughter, etc., that + the drama at RKO itself! Lots of fun, especially with the Muller treatment.
So, the two escaped convicts are on the run, & intend to hide at the ghost town within the nuclear test site, figuring the authorities would likely assume they were headed for Mexico, etc. Sam Hurley (Stephen McNally) is the Duke Mantee-type, don't mess with this guy, he won't hesitate to kill you. The other escapee, Bart Moore (Paul Kelly) has a bullet in his gut, and is not so evil as Hurley. They steal a car, which breaks down, & flag-down a passing car, which they hijack, along with its passengers. Alarmed when they learn of the destination, the passengers are helpless, even after informing the criminals of the detonation scheduled for 6 AM the very next morning.
9/10!
So, the two escaped convicts are on the run, & intend to hide at the ghost town within the nuclear test site, figuring the authorities would likely assume they were headed for Mexico, etc. Sam Hurley (Stephen McNally) is the Duke Mantee-type, don't mess with this guy, he won't hesitate to kill you. The other escapee, Bart Moore (Paul Kelly) has a bullet in his gut, and is not so evil as Hurley. They steal a car, which breaks down, & flag-down a passing car, which they hijack, along with its passengers. Alarmed when they learn of the destination, the passengers are helpless, even after informing the criminals of the detonation scheduled for 6 AM the very next morning.
here is the best ending: The test site guys decide that because bad weather is approaching, they will advance the test from 6 to 5AM! The bad guys are already about to leave, but Hurley intending to tie-up the others so they cannot tell on them, while Moore, having had the bullet removed and in very delicate condition, says no, let them go. Just then, the 5 minute warning siren sounds, & the crooks flee with the very unfaithful wife of the physician who removed the bullet from Moore, slipping into the car with them. They are in too much hurry to throw her out. Those remaining in the saloon quickly hurry to an old gold mine for shelter. Hurley, being panicked, drives the wrong direction, and until he sees the bomb itself, fails to realize his error! turning around, puts the rear tires on loose sand, no traction, panic, I laughed as Hurley desperately tried to get the car to move. Finally, it goes, but when the bomb detonated, they were right in the middle of the target town!
I am not too familiar with physics, but I believe the venturi effect would suck all the air from the mine, & those inside would suffocate. Either that, or they would be sucked out, and be thrust into the blast. Either way. they are dead.
Take that, script-writer!
I am not too familiar with physics, but I believe the venturi effect would suck all the air from the mine, & those inside would suffocate. Either that, or they would be sucked out, and be thrust into the blast. Either way. they are dead.
Take that, script-writer!9/10!
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Lady of Winterfell
Foxy Lady
Watched Inside Out 2. It's been so long since I've seen Inside Out I can't really compare them, but I thought it was another good and enjoyable Pixar installment.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Splatter University (1984)
Lousy slasher. Nut escapes from a mental hospital, killing one of the really unprofessional folks working there along the way. Two years later he kills a teacher at a Catholic university. (Why Catholic? As part of our Shocking Twist Ending, which you'll see coming a mile away.) Next semester a new teacher shows up. After wasting lots of time with the antics of the world's most obnoxious college students, more folks get killed. Amateurish all the way around.
Lousy slasher. Nut escapes from a mental hospital, killing one of the really unprofessional folks working there along the way. Two years later he kills a teacher at a Catholic university. (Why Catholic? As part of our Shocking Twist Ending, which you'll see coming a mile away.) Next semester a new teacher shows up. After wasting lots of time with the antics of the world's most obnoxious college students, more folks get killed. Amateurish all the way around.
JUGGERNAUT - 1974 - Mad bomber puts a half dozen bombs on a cruise liner and bomb disposal expert Richard Harris (assisted by David Hemmings) has to do the job ("If it were easy then everybody'd be doing it and what would become of us?") of figuring out how to disarm them. I have seen it before but it is still suspenseful as Hell when they are unscrewing the plates.
The human interest stuff is insignificant but the bomb scenes are very tense. Released 50 years ago this week.
The human interest stuff is insignificant but the bomb scenes are very tense. Released 50 years ago this week.
"Red lads! Cut the red R-E-D RED!"
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Nurse Sherri (1977)
Schlockmeister Al Adamson gave us this bottom-of-the-barrel supernatural flick. Cult leader tries to revive a guy who has been dead for a couple of weeks (extra wearing Hallowe'en zombie makeup) and has a heart attack in the process. He dies on the operating table, but takes over the body of (you guessed it) Nurse Sherrie, using her to kill the doctors who failed to save his life. The possession is shown as poorly animated green blobs floating over Nurse Sherrie. She goes on to speak in his voice (poor dubbing) and dispatch folks with pitchfork and knife. Along the way we'll have an extended car chase and an utterly gratuitous scene in which another nurse provides intimate services for a patient. Fortunately, there's a patient, a football star blinded in an automobile accident, whose Haitian grandma taught him all about this kind of thing, telling the other nurses to dig up the cult leader's body and burn it.
You know what you're in for when the opening credits blatantly steal the theme music from the old Tv series One Step Beyond. Ultra-low budget incompetence with laughable special effects.
Schlockmeister Al Adamson gave us this bottom-of-the-barrel supernatural flick. Cult leader tries to revive a guy who has been dead for a couple of weeks (extra wearing Hallowe'en zombie makeup) and has a heart attack in the process. He dies on the operating table, but takes over the body of (you guessed it) Nurse Sherrie, using her to kill the doctors who failed to save his life. The possession is shown as poorly animated green blobs floating over Nurse Sherrie. She goes on to speak in his voice (poor dubbing) and dispatch folks with pitchfork and knife. Along the way we'll have an extended car chase and an utterly gratuitous scene in which another nurse provides intimate services for a patient. Fortunately, there's a patient, a football star blinded in an automobile accident, whose Haitian grandma taught him all about this kind of thing, telling the other nurses to dig up the cult leader's body and burn it.
You know what you're in for when the opening credits blatantly steal the theme music from the old Tv series One Step Beyond. Ultra-low budget incompetence with laughable special effects.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Scared to Death (1980)
Low budget monster movie. A series of murders are thought to be the work of a serial killer. The detective on the case wants his buddy, formerly of the police and now a novelist, to help because "he's the best." (We never get any evidence of this.)
Meanwhile, a lot of time is wasted with the designated hero's romance, which starts when he smashes into the love interest's car. Killings follow, the love interest is attacked and goes into a coma (despite the fact that we've seen super-bloody murders already.) Hero doesn't do much until a woman shows up who can tell him everything.
She worked with a scientist who created a SYNGENOR (synthesized genetic organism.) Why it should happen to be an aggressive creature that feeds on spinal fluid remains unexplained. Apparently the love interest was supposed to be one of the barely living folks it feeds on, instead of one of the ones it just plain kills, but she's fortunate enough to wind up in a hospital.
Very much "inspired" by Alien, particularly in the monster design.
Low budget monster movie. A series of murders are thought to be the work of a serial killer. The detective on the case wants his buddy, formerly of the police and now a novelist, to help because "he's the best." (We never get any evidence of this.)
Meanwhile, a lot of time is wasted with the designated hero's romance, which starts when he smashes into the love interest's car. Killings follow, the love interest is attacked and goes into a coma (despite the fact that we've seen super-bloody murders already.) Hero doesn't do much until a woman shows up who can tell him everything.
She worked with a scientist who created a SYNGENOR (synthesized genetic organism.) Why it should happen to be an aggressive creature that feeds on spinal fluid remains unexplained. Apparently the love interest was supposed to be one of the barely living folks it feeds on, instead of one of the ones it just plain kills, but she's fortunate enough to wind up in a hospital.
Very much "inspired" by Alien, particularly in the monster design.
alexvss
Me doesn't knows no grammar.
Zatoichi (2003). The story of the legendary blind samurai as viewed by Takeshi Kitano (pun intended).
This one didn't quite work for me. I thought the CGI blood wouldn't bother me, but it did. And I didn't like the movie's tone and mood. The best part was the musical performance at the end.
This one didn't quite work for me. I thought the CGI blood wouldn't bother me, but it did. And I didn't like the movie's tone and mood. The best part was the musical performance at the end.
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I found the CGI blood in that film really annoying.
Jeffbert
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I had a spinal tap some 30 years ago. One is enough!
The title seems familiar, perhaps more than one film uses it.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Yes, Scared to Death is perhaps best known as the title of a Bela Lugosi movie (in color!)
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
The Kindred (1987)
Monster movie with two, count 'em, two Oscar-winning mad scientists. Unlike many creature features, this one also has too much rather than too little plot. In brief, just before mad scientist #1 Kim Hunter dies she tells her physician son to destroy her notes. She also mentions his brother Anthony. He has no idea he has a brother. Meanwhile, mad scientist #2 Rod Steiger pays thugs to bring him the bodies of braindead but living victims of accidents, stealing them from ambulances. Steiger was working with Hunter and has his own plans for Anthony. There's also a mysterious British woman who shows up, claiming to have admired Hunter's work, but she's got a Dark Secret of her own. Suffice to say that tentacled horrors and body transformations follow.
A little bit Alien, a little bit "The Dunwich Horror," a little bit David Cronenberg, with lots of slimy special effects. Better than average for this kind of thing.
Iron Warrior (1987)
Third in the Ator series of sword-and-sorcery films. No continuity with the others. In this one, Ator's brother is captured by a bad witch and made into a warrior wearing a metal skull helmet. The good witches exile her to "the underland" for an oddly specific eighteen years. (There's one leader among them and three others; one redhead, one blonde, and one blue-skinned brunette.) During this trial of sorts, the bad witch is surrounded by something that looks like a spinning red hula hoop.
Naturally, she comes back and takes over a kingdom. Our mandatory beautiful princess (who has one brown eyebrow and one red eyebrow) goes on the run, Ator comes to her aid. Random stuff happens. Ator and skull helmet fight several times. Notable is the battle in which they toss spears at each other, catching them and throwing them back over and over.
Pretty incoherent, really. Often visually interesting. (Nice locations, borrowed sets.) Pretty much looks like an extended heavy metal video.
There's a fourth Ator film, but without Miles O'Keefe; and what good is Ator without Miles and Miles of O'Keefe?
Monster movie with two, count 'em, two Oscar-winning mad scientists. Unlike many creature features, this one also has too much rather than too little plot. In brief, just before mad scientist #1 Kim Hunter dies she tells her physician son to destroy her notes. She also mentions his brother Anthony. He has no idea he has a brother. Meanwhile, mad scientist #2 Rod Steiger pays thugs to bring him the bodies of braindead but living victims of accidents, stealing them from ambulances. Steiger was working with Hunter and has his own plans for Anthony. There's also a mysterious British woman who shows up, claiming to have admired Hunter's work, but she's got a Dark Secret of her own. Suffice to say that tentacled horrors and body transformations follow.
A little bit Alien, a little bit "The Dunwich Horror," a little bit David Cronenberg, with lots of slimy special effects. Better than average for this kind of thing.
Iron Warrior (1987)
Third in the Ator series of sword-and-sorcery films. No continuity with the others. In this one, Ator's brother is captured by a bad witch and made into a warrior wearing a metal skull helmet. The good witches exile her to "the underland" for an oddly specific eighteen years. (There's one leader among them and three others; one redhead, one blonde, and one blue-skinned brunette.) During this trial of sorts, the bad witch is surrounded by something that looks like a spinning red hula hoop.
Naturally, she comes back and takes over a kingdom. Our mandatory beautiful princess (who has one brown eyebrow and one red eyebrow) goes on the run, Ator comes to her aid. Random stuff happens. Ator and skull helmet fight several times. Notable is the battle in which they toss spears at each other, catching them and throwing them back over and over.
Pretty incoherent, really. Often visually interesting. (Nice locations, borrowed sets.) Pretty much looks like an extended heavy metal video.
There's a fourth Ator film, but without Miles O'Keefe; and what good is Ator without Miles and Miles of O'Keefe?
MONSTERS CRASH THE PAJAMA PARTY - 1965 - starring Vic McGee, the Lionel Barrymore of Z-grade films, directed by David L Hewitt. This is some kind of comedy(?) about a mad scientist (McGee) who turns collage kids into gorillas that look an awful lot like an economy Halloween costume rental. Mercifully short.
THE BEACH GIRLS AND THE MONSTER - 1965 - Now this is more like it! Not a good film exactly but creative and entertaining--and even the inexplicable surfing footage included for no apparent reason was kind of cool. The twist at the end was not bad--especially when the "monster" gets into a car and goes on a weavy rear-projected road chase that reminded me of the Robert Stack driving scene in Airplane.
THE BEACH GIRLS AND THE MONSTER - 1965 - Now this is more like it! Not a good film exactly but creative and entertaining--and even the inexplicable surfing footage included for no apparent reason was kind of cool. The twist at the end was not bad--especially when the "monster" gets into a car and goes on a weavy rear-projected road chase that reminded me of the Robert Stack driving scene in Airplane.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
Just saw the first one recently. Pretty painful. As part of a live show in a theater, as intended, maybe goofy fun.
The latter (which I've seen on TV as Monster From the Surf as part of a double feature with the similarly themed The Horror of Party Beach) is a romp. I note in particular the ventriloquist with a lion puppet who sings the (alternate) title song.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
The Flesh and the Fiends (1960)
Based on the infamous body snatchers and murderers Burke and Hare. Peter Cushing is Doctor Knox, who receives the cadavers. Donald Pleasence is Hare A handsome, well-acted production. There's some comment on social class as well, with the contrast between a young medical student and the lower class woman he loves. Recommended.
Based on the infamous body snatchers and murderers Burke and Hare. Peter Cushing is Doctor Knox, who receives the cadavers. Donald Pleasence is Hare A handsome, well-acted production. There's some comment on social class as well, with the contrast between a young medical student and the lower class woman he loves. Recommended.
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