October Positivity: Thy Neighbor (dir by George A. Johnson)

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

2017’s Thy Neighbor led me to spend way too much time thinking about neighborhood hot tub etiquette.

Amber Reynolds (Jessica Koloian) is the wife of pastor Zach Reynolds (Nathan Clarkson). Zach used to be fat. Zach used to pick fights and carry a gun. However, Zach lost a ton of weight, wrote a book about how he got thin and conquered his anger issues, and is now something of a celebrity. He’s been invited to be the new pastor at the local megachurch and, upon moving into their new home, Amber makes it a point to bake cookies for all of her new neighbors. One of the neighbors (Dave Payton) — who is simply called The Neighbor for the majority of the film — doesn’t care much for church but he sure does like those cookies. Zach thinks that the Neighbor is creepy and he doesn’t want Amber having anything to do with him. Amber thinks that the Neighbor needs someone to talk to so she invites him to come relax in the hot tub with her.

Seriously….

My neighbors across the street have a hot tub and I’ve pretty much got an open invitation to use it whenever I want. Many a night, we’ve all relaxed in the hot tub and talked about whatever we felt like talking about at the time. But I’m also extremely close to my neighbors. I have a lot in common with my neighbors, as we all graduated from the same college and we tend to have similar cultural and political outlooks. They’re friends, along with being neighbors and it also helps that we all look in our swimsuits. And even so, they still got to know me a little before they said, “Hey, feel free to come use our hot tub whenever you feel like it.” My point is that I have a hard time buying that anyone, regardless of how nice they are or how much they want to help their husband win points around the neighborhood, would invite a total stranger to strip down and join them in the hot tub. That’s especially true when you’re the mother of a young son and your husband is away from the house and when the stranger in question is kind of creepy and bizarrely aggressive in the way that he talks to people.

Zach is not amused to return home and find the Neighbor in the hot tub. After the Neighbor leaves, Amber argues that Zach needs to make an effort to reach out to everyone, even creepy people like The Neighbor. As for The Neighbor, he starts trying to break up Zach and Amber’s marriage by trying to get Zach to lose his temper and trying to convince Amber that Zach is having an affair with a church secretary….

This is not a typical faith-based film. It’s a thriller, one that conveys its message with a minimum amount of preaching and which features a trio of strong performances from Koloian, Clarkson, and Payton. The film argues that everyone should be treated with kindness while, at the same time, acknowledging that some people are very, very annoying. The Neighbor is a total creep but he’s also someone who appears to have spent a good deal of his life being victimized. Unusually for a film of this sort, Thy Neighbor ends on a rather dark and melancholy note, again acknowledging that things are not always as easy as the movies would have us believe. Amber is determined to be kind while Zach cannot let go of his suspicions. In the end, it’s obvious that it’ll take more than a few hours in the hot tub to fix these broken souls.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Friday the 13th: The Series 2.12 “The Playhouse”

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Friday the 13th: The Series, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on YouTube!

Agck! Stranger danger!

Episode 2.12 “The Playhouse”

(Dir by Tom McLoughlin, originally aired on January 28th, 1989)

Mike and Janine Carlson (played by Robert Oliveri and Lisa Jakub) are two young siblings living in the suburbs. They don’t have much of a life. Their mother (Belinda Metz) is neglectful and continually complains that her children are the reason why she can’t find a rich boyfriend. Mike and Janine don’t appear to have any close friends. Children are vanishing all over town and parents are telling their kids, “Don’t go off with strangers!” but no one seems to care enough about Mike and Janine to even check to make sure that they haven’t been kidnapped.

Mike and Janine have a playhouse, a gift that was given to them by one of their mother’s former boyfriends. The playhouse is the only place where they feel happy. It’s a place where they literally get anything that they wish for. But sometimes, the door to the playhouse is locked. When that happens, Mike and Janine have to convince someone else to go into the playhouse. Once someone enters the playhouse, they find themselves trapped in a nightmarish world that is full of evil clowns and other circus figures. Mike and Janine have to chant, “I hate you! I hate you!” while the playhouse claims its victims.

Agck! Seriously, this is a disturbing episode! Not only are Mike and Janine terribly abused but almost all of their victims are children. Perhaps because of the age of the people involved, this is the only episode of Friday the 13th: The Series in which no one dies. They’re held prisoner in the playhouse and probably traumatized for life but they don’t die. Fortunately, that means that they can be freed once Jack convinces Mike to chant, “I love you!” instead of “I hate you!”

Yep, this episode is all about the power of love but you really have to wonder if all of Mike and Janine’s problems can be solved by chanting, “I love you!” I mean, aren’t the other kids going to remember that Mike and Janine held them prisoner in a nightmare universe? The episode may end with the playhouse defeated by Mike and Janine are still living in that terrible suburb and their mother is still a resentful alcoholic. Even though this episode has what would most would consider to be a happy ending — the kids are free! — it’s still incredibly dark.

This episode definitely left me feeling a bit shaken. I hate seeing children in danger and that’s what this episode was all about. Even things that sound kind of silly — like Mike chanting “I hate you!” while the playhouse does its thing — are actually rather disturbing when viewed. The child actors are almost too convincing in this episode. In the end, Jack says that all you need is love but this episode leaves you wondering if he’s correct.

Horror On TV: One Step Beyond Episode 1.4 “The Dark Room” (dir by John Newland)

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On tonight’s episode of One Step Beyond, Cloris Leachman plays Rita Wallace, an American photographer in France. She’s looking for a model whose face will serve as the ultimate symbol of the country. One day, a haunted-looking man (Marel Dalio) shows up at her apartment. She thinks he’s a model. The truth, needless to say, is something quite different….

This episode features good performances from both Leachman and Dalio. In real life, Dalio was an icon of French cinema and a favorite of Jean Renoir’s. When the Nazis invaded France, the Jewish Dalio fled Paris and, after a harrowing journey, eventually made it to America. In America, he played the croupier in Casablanca and appeared in several other films. Tragically, the rest of his family did not escape and were murdered by the Nazis. Dalio returned to France after the end of the war and remained an in-demand character actor for several more decades, making his final film appearance in 1980.

The Darkroom originally aired on February 10th, 1959.

October Hacks: Splatter University (dir by Richard W. Haines)

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

As we started to watch 1984’s Splatter University, Jeff warned me that, “This is not a great movie.”

I laughed. “Hey,” I said, “I just watched Satan’s Children. How bad can it be?”

I looked at the screen and was immediately confronted by a poorly animated picture of the New York Skyline.

“Oh crap,” I said.

Four words appeared on screen: “A Troma Team Release”

“Oh, no!” I shouted….

Still, I’m not one to stop watching a film once it starts so I watched the entirety of Splatter University. Fortunately, it was only 78 minutes long and, regardless of what else one might say about it, it did not waste much time getting to the murders. Within the opening few minutes, an orderly in a mental hospital got stabbed in the crotch, with the camera zooming in on the blood spurting out from his groin, The patient who stabbed him took the orderly’s clothes (which, quite frankly, should have been covered in blood so I’m not sure that they would actually be the ideal disguise) and makes his escape.

Three years later, a sociology professor is brutally stabbed to death in her classroom at St. Trinian’s College and again, the camera zooms in on the spurting blood, as if to make sure that no one accuses the film of lying about the “splatter” part. Her quickly-hired replacement is Julie Parker (Forbes Riley), who soon notices that someone seems to be murdering her students. Being a good teacher, Julie decides to protect her students by figuring out who the murderer is at St. Trinian’s College. Fortunately, there aren’t that many suspects, for two reasons. Number one, the students and faculty die with such frequency that it’s easy to guess who is responsible by process of elimination. Number two, it appears that the makers of this film could only afford a handful of actors. St. Trinian’s appears to have about twenty students and most of them appear to be in their early forties.

On the one hand, as I mentioned previously, Splatter University does live up to its name. It’s obvious that the production didn’t have a huge budget but it appears that the majority of what the filmmakers did have was spent on fake blood and entrails because a lot of blood is spilled and one particularly gruesome scene even involves intestines spilling out of a body. Agck! (Seriously, the sight of the large intestine always freaks me out.) I really can’t fault the film as a slasher flick, even if the killer’s identity is obvious. That said, this was still a Troma release and, as such, there’s a lot about it that sucks. Apparently, the original film was too short so Troma added some badly acted, “comedic” scenes of the students acting stupid. Those scenes pad out the film’s length but they also screw with the pacing and they distract the viewer from what is otherwise a crudely affective, low-budget American giallo film. But that’s Troma for you!

(And, let’s be honest — how can you not love Lloyd Kaufman?)

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Satan’s Children (dir by Joe Wiezycki)

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1974 film, Satan’s Children, tells the story of unfortunate Bobby Douglas (Stephen White).

Bobby is a teenager who lives in a hideous suburban house with his stepfather (Eldon Mecham) and his stepsister (Joyce Molloy), who looks old enough to be Bobby’s mother. Bobby’s a rebellious kid who doesn’t understand why he should always have to cut the grass while his stepsister hangs out by the pool. Bobby is sick of the whole scene, man. When his stepfather yells at Bobby for having a small stash of marijuana in his room, Bobby decides to run away from home. Seriously, that scene was totally melvin so I don’t blame Bobby.

Bobby goes to a bar, where an old man tries to talk to him until Jake (Bob Barcour) tells the old man to get lost. Jake tells Bobby that he has to be careful because there are perverts all over the place. Bobby nods and laughs because Bobby’s not a square. He knows what’s up. Jake invites Bobby to come hang out at his place and Bobby is like, “Cool, way too friendly stranger, I’ll get you in your rape van.” Bobby goes home with Jake and is promptly raped. With Bobby naked and bound, Jake calls all of his friends over and Bobby is then gang raped. The scene where Jake and his friends drive the bound Bobby around is pure nightmare fuel and I can only imagine how audiences in 1974 reacted to it.

The next morning, a group of hippies found Bobby lying in a field and they take him back to their commune. Of course, these folks aren’t just hippies. They’re also Satanists! Sherry (Kathleen Marie Archer) wants to let Bobby stay with them while she nurses him back to health. Joshua (John Edwards), an older member of the group, says that Bobby isn’t welcome because Bobby is probably “queer.” Simon (Robert C. Ray II), the turtleneck-wearing leader of the group, is also hesitant to allow Bobby to stay and again, it’s because Simon assumes Bobby must be gay. Simon also makes it clear that he doesn’t want any lesbians in his Satanic cult either. He just wants people who are prepared to carry out a blood sacrifice….

(I swear, that Satan. Not only is he the ruler of Hell and the tormenter of souls and the fallen angel responsible for getting Adam and Eve kicked out of the Garden and bringing sin into the world, he’s also apparently a massive homophobe!)

While the Satanists torture Sherry for displeasing Simon, Bobby tries to figure out a way to escape. Fair warning: the majority of the film’s finale involves Bobby running around in tighty-whities, which get progressively more and more mud-stained as the movie goes on. Seriously, ew! On the other hand, not one but two people manage to die as a result of accidentally wandering into quicksand. If nothing else, it’s a reminder that Bobby isn’t the only incredibly stupid person in the movie.

This is a weird movie. I imagine it was made to capitalize on the notoriety of the Manson Family but, with its extended opening scenes in the suburbs, it instead becomes an ennui-drenched look at how far people will go to escape conventional society. Despite all the of the truly terrible things that happen to him, Bobby is not a sympathetic or likable character. In fact, he comes across as being just the type of idiot who probably would get sucked into a cult. That said, the film is truly a unique (if rather slow) experience and the brutal ending took me totally by surprise. Like many grindhouse film, Satan’s Children is an oddity that you truly can’t look away from.

In The Shadow of Guilt (2022, directed by Keven Russell)

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Jedadiah Leland

An alcoholic writer is driving drunk when she runs over a little girl. At first, she gets out to help but when she sees that the girl is dead, she just apologizes and drives off. Later, she and another writer are at a rustic retreat. The drunk writer has writer’s block. The other writer has a secret. A neighbor tells a story about another little girl who was killed mysteriously. Eventually, a ghost shows up because the alcoholic has been living in the shadow of guilt.

I liked the idea behind this one but the action moved slowly and the two main actresses were not convincing. It’s only a 62 minute film but it seemed like an eternity. The ghost special effects were effective enough, though there were a few times when it looked like the ghost’s mask was about to fall off. Brian Stewart, as the neighbor, did a good job in his one big scene. They should have made the entire movie about him. Main message: Don’t drive drunk and things like this movie won’t happen to you.

Retro Television Review: T and T 3.17 “Nightmare”

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing T. and T., a Canadian show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on Tubi!

This week, Terri is approached by a man who claims to be a political refugee. But is he really? It’s a good thing T.S. Turner doesn’t have anything better to do than help her out.

Episode 3.17 “Nightmare”

(Dir by Don McCutcheon, originally aired on April 28th, 1990)

While walking down the street in Canada, Terri is approached by a desperate man (William Colgate), who introduces himself as Sebastian Fuentes. He explains that he was a newspaper editor in his native country of San Miguel. After a left-wing death squad killed his family, Sebastian fled to North America. Now, he needs Terri’s help to be designated a refugee. He claims that there are people from San Miguel who want him dead and, for that reason, he cannot risk going to the authorities or even being seen in Terri’s office. He says he has to hide, no matter what.

Terri doesn’t know anything about immigration law. Both T.S Turner and a sleazy lawyer named Kerr (Don Allison) warn her that she shouldn’t be so quick to believe Sebastian’s story. But something about Sebastian’s fear touches Terri’s heart and she agrees to help him.

Unfortunately, it turns out that both Turner and Kerr were correct. Sebastian is actually a colonel who murdered the real Sebastian. The nightmares that haunt him are not about watching his family being killed but instead about being the killer himself. The people who are searching for him are not government agents but instead the relatives of the people who he victimized in his home country. Eventually, Sebastian’s real identity is discovered by some fellow refugees (one of whom is played by a young Jill Hennessy) and he ends up in prison, haunted by his crimes.

This was an unusually serious episode of T and T. Indeed, it was shot more like an episode of Monsters than a typical episode of this show. Unfortunately, with the exception of Don Allison’s performance as the sleazy Mr. Kerr, the acting in this episode was pretty dodgy and it was easy to guess that Sebastian was going to turn out to not be who he said he was.

Probably the most interesting thing about this episode is that it aired 34 years ago but the issues that it deals with are the same issues that are going on today. Dictators are still coming to power and abusing their citizens and, as a result, refugees are still flooding over the border. The immigration system is still broken and it doesn’t appear that anyone is truly interested in finding a way to fix it. This episode aired in 1990, long before men like Venezuela’s Maduro came to power. The issues that are dealt with in this episode existed before the current crop of dictators and they will undoubtedly continue even after people like Maduro fade into history.

“Cookies” Short Film Review By Case Wright

Posted on October 4, 2024 by casewright

Hello Horrorthon readers! Here is another short film review because this is midterms season and I pressed for time, BUT I want to do right by my Glorious Leader – Lisa! I can’t write that I hated this. I must be getting soft. It’s really difficult to understand this particular short, but it began and ended.

A boy scout is selling Boy Scout cookies and a very aggressive woman wants to buy his cookies- if he comes inside her home. The boy runs away. It is a story. It turns out that she’s got man held captive and we don’t know why or care, but the story began, ended, and I laughed once. Considering how bad some shorts are- yes, I’m looking at you Alex – defiler of all physical laws – Magana, which I prove here:

https://unobtainium13.com/2022/10/12/smiling-woman-2-review-by-case-wright/

Maybe this is all that I need or deserve? Maybe my life should be more simple? My life is subtracting now and I would give anything for addition, but I would need an interested lady for that and that’s hard to come by right now; so, I’m left with subtraction and this okay short……

Scenes That I Love: Anthony Perkins in Psycho

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

You have to feel a bit bad for Anthony Perkins, who was an Oscar-nominated star of film and Broadway and something of a teen idol before he was cast as Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 masterpiece, Psycho. Perkins was so convincing in the role that he pretty much spent the majority of his career either playing variations of the character or appearing in small roles where his macabre screen image would not be too much of a problem. Perkins gave one of the best film performances of all time and his career never really recovered from it.

Unfortunately, there’s a tendency to overlook just how good Anthony Perkins was in this first Psycho. People look at his later, less-compelling performances and they make the mistake of thinking those performance were the best that Perkins was capable of giving. Perkins was a fine actor and never better than when he played Norman. The scene below highlight how Perkins managed to make Norman Bates both poignant and creepy at the same time.

Book Review: Runaway Train Or, The Story Of My Life So Far by Eric Roberts with Sam Kasher

Posted on October 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Hell yeah, Eric Roberts has written a book!

A friend of mine recently sent me Eric Roberts’s just published autobiography as a gift. I was excited because, as any of our regular readers know, I am a huge fan of the insanely busy Eric Roberts. That said, I wasn’t really expecting much from the book because most Hollywood autobiographies that I’ve read have had a tendency to be a bit dry. Often times, the author (or their ghost writer, as the case may be) is either too concerned about not offending anyone or too bitter about the state of their career to really provide much honest insight into their life or their chosen profession.

Eric Roberts, however, is the exception to the rule. Runaway Train is a fascinating read. Roberts comes across as being very honest about his career, his demons, his family, and his compulsive need to always be working. Roberts admits to being a workaholic but, as he explains it, it’s better to be addicted to acting than to be addicted to cocaine. And I have to say that I think he has a point there.

Roberts writes about his dysfunctional childhood, his time as a star, and his more recent career as an actor who is willing to appear in just about everything. He writes about his addictions and how they almost ruined his life. He writes about his marriage to Eliza and fully takes responsibility for all the times that he’s screwed up. (Roberts screwing up is a recurring theme throughout the book, almost to the extent that you just want to give the guy a hug and tell him to stop being so hard on himself.) He writes about the time that he spent as a patient of Dr. Drew on Celebrity Rehab. (In perhaps the book’s funniest moment, he realizes that he needs to be addicted to something if he’s going to go on Celebrity Rehab. Eventually, he agrees to go on the show for help with his marijuana addiction, despite Roberts belief, which I agree with, that you can’t actually get addicted to marijuana.) Roberts writes about some of his films, though he obviously can’t write about all 700 of them. So, while there is no Top Gunner trivia, there are three pretty interesting chapters devoted to Star 80, The Pope of Greenwich Village, and Runaway Train.

Roberts does write about other celebrities, though he does so in a way that is neither petty nor obsequious. He writes about his friendship with Robin Williams with an honesty that few other celebs would be willing to risk. Danny Trejo, Eddie Bunker, Mickey Rourke, Christopher Walken, Sterling Hayden, Doug Kenney, Sharon Stone, Rod Steiger, and Sylvester Stallone all show up at one point or another. And yes, Eric Roberts does write about his relationship with both his sister Julia and his daughter, Emma. Eric is open about he and Julia having been occasionally estranged but he manages to do so in a way that protects everyone’s privacy. One might never expect this from some of the roles that he’s played but Eric Roberts comes across as being a pretty classy, if somewhat eccentric, guy.

I loved this memoir. I recommend it to all of you.