Hi! Do you know what today is? That’s right, it’s October 24th! That means only one more week to go until Halloween. And what better way to observe this important date than with an old, low-budget B-movie that’s fallen into the public domain?
I first discovered The Brain That Wouldn’t Die through the Drive-In Mob on twitter. It first came out in 1962 and it’s 82 minutes of medical malpractice, bitchy disembodied heads, and a scary monster hiding in a closet. Well, not really that scary. However, the monster does rip-off of one guy’s arm. Luckily, the guy has another arm obviously tucked away underneath his lab coat.
As a sidenote, this is a low-budget film and you can tell just by looking at it. However, I kinda think that the harsh lighting and the stark sets add a little something to the film, the key word being little.
Anyway, if you’ve got 82 minutes to kill and a strong tolerance for bossy heads, check out The Brain That Wouldn’t Die…
Last night, I watched the “Lifetime world premiere” of the 2008 horror film, The Alphabet Killer.
Why Was I Watching It?
Because I was, okay? Don’t judge me!
Actually, I was watching for 2 reasons:
1) Being the kinda morbid girly girl that I am, my love of a good Lifetime movie is almost equalled by my love for reading about unsolved murders. A little while ago, I was going through my copy of Michael Newton’s Encyclopedia of Unsolved Crimes and I happened to come across the Alphabet Murders. In the early 70s, three young girls were murdered in New York. Each of the girls’ first and last names started with the same letter and each body was found in a town that started with the same letter as the girls’ name. Now, this kinda freaked me out because, if I ever decided to use my mom’s maiden name, then my name would be (Lisa) Marie Marchi. That, of course, would make me a potential victim — especially when you consider that the town of McKinney, Texas is within driving distance. I mean, seriously. File that under things that make you go “Agck!”
2) When I first saw the commercials for the Alphabet Killer (which was advertised as being a “Lifetime world premiere!” even though the film wasn’t originally made for the Lifetime network), I immediately assumed that it had to be one of those terrible Ulli Lommel true crime films. And I was all like, “Really? Ulli Lommel is now a member of the Lifetime family? This, I have to see!” Well, turns out that he’s not and, quite frankly, thank goodness for that. This Alphabet Killer was directed by the director of Wrong Turn, Rob Schmidt.
What’s It About
There’s a serial killer on the loose and fortunately, Detective Eliza Dushku is on the case. Less fortunately, Detective Dushku is already dealing with adult onset schizophrenia…
What Worked
The idea of a schizophrenic detective trying to catch a serial killer is a pretty clever one and director Rob Schmidt did a fairly good job making the audience wonder how much of what we’re watching is a real and how much is just the product of the detective’s psychosis. Eliza Dushku, who kicks ass in general because she was Faith the Vampire Slayer, gives an excellent performance. I had a hard time, at first, believing she was a cop but I did believe her as a schizophrenic and yes, that is meant as a compliment.
As well, the entire cast did a pretty good job, particularly Cary Elwes and Timothy Hutton. Both of them brought some interesting layers of complexity to thinly written characters.
The scenes where the dead would literally confront Eliza Dushku were well done, even though I’ve seen the same scene in countless other horror films.
While I was watching the Alphabet Killer, I had the house to myself because my sister Erin had gone into Arlington for the Rangers game. When I was about halfway through the film (I was watching it off of my DVR), Dallas got hit with the storm of the century. Seriously. It started raining around one in the morning and at 1:10, the power went off. The TV (and the movie) flicked off with a sharp THRACK and the entire house was plunged into darkness. My bedroom was suddenly pitch black and I found myself feeling very vulnerable lying in bed in only my beloved Pirates t-shirt and panties. All I could hear was the sound of rain and hail pounding against the house while somewhere in the distance, sirens wailed. After the first flash of lightning briefly illuminated my shadowy bedroom, I started to count. I had barely started to form the word, “Two…” when a deafening explosion of thunder caused not only the house to shake but me to have to catch my breath. Suddenly, I heard a wailing meow and another flash of lightning briefly revealed my cat Doc sitting in my doorway. Stumbling through the darkness, I managed to get Doc and carry him back to my bed with me. I sat there with him, fully knowing that even though I was trying to protect him, he probably thought he was protecting me. (Or, more likely seeing as how he’s a cat, claiming me as his territory.) Suddenly, a terrible thought entered my mind: “Did I remember to lock the front door? Or the back door?” Was I hearing the wind and rain pounding against my house or was I hearing the Alphabet Killer stumbling around downstairs? Finally, after half an hour of this, the lights finally came back on and I could breathe again. I slowly made my way downstairs (Doc, of course, stayed up in my room and went to sleep) and discovered that I had indeed locked all the doors before the storm. So yay me!
Now that I was fully freaked out, I went ahead and watched the rest of the Alphabet Killer. I’m not sure if it was the movie that kept my uneasy or if it was the storm. All I know is that it worked. (The rain, by the way, mysteriously ended as soon as the movie did.)
What Didn’t Work
This is another one of those films where the idea behind it is actually more clever than the way that the idea is actually executed. Once you get passed the idea that Dushku is schizophrenic, you realize that the film itself is actually pretty predictable. If you can identify the killer from the minute he first appears on screen, then you might not be that smart. Just saying.
Needless to say, The Alphabet Killer has next to nothing to do with the actual case. Normally, this wouldn’t be a big deal because that’s the grindhouse way, right? But in this case, the truth is so interesting that it’s a shame that it was pretty much just shoved over to the side. If there isn’t one already, somebody needs to do one of those hour-long, basic cable documentaries about the Alphabet murders. And Bill Kurtis needs to host it.
“OMG! Just Like Me!” Moments
Honestly, if I was tracking a serial killer, I’d probably do it in much the same way as Eliza Dushku does in this film. By that, I mean I’d probably be way too obsessive for my own good and I’d eventually end up strapped to a table somewhere. Seriously, I just don’t think I’m meant to hunt serial killers.
Lessons Learned
It’s good to be a Bowman and sometimes, storms can actually be scary.
Kevin Smith’s 2011 film was a major departure for him. It wasn’t the usual comedy (his last one being the very awful buddy-cop comedy, Cop Out) but instead his first foray into one of film’s earliest film genre: the horror film. Say what you want or feel about Kevin Smith (and there’s a huge range of people who either love the man or hate him like the second coming of the Antichrist) but when he decides to make a film he puts everything of himself on display and he wears his emotions on his sleeves when it comes to his films. It’s this aspect of Smith’s personality which has gained him such a loyal following, but has also earned him the scorn and, for some, hate of film bloggers who now constitute the bulk of film criticism in the digital age. This first horror film for Kevin Smith would be called Red State and it would be a film that would continue to expand the gulf between those who hate him and those who support him. Lost in this playground-like tiff was whether the film would be a return to form for Smith or just a continuation of some very bad films in the last half-decade.
Red State could almost be called a coming-of-age story since the film begins with three high school boys joining together to travel to a neighboring town where they hope to engage in some sexual extracurricular activities. It’s also in this very town that we learn very early on in the film that the Five Points Church calls home. This church and it’s congregation has one Pastor Abin Cooper (Michael Parks) as it’s leader with it’s membership either related by blood to Cooper or by way of marriage. In this picture would arrive an ATF task force led by Special Agent Keenan (John Goodman) to investigate the illegal doings of Cooper and his flock. It’s between these two groups that the three teenage boys would find themselves in a horrific situation with their lives in the balance.
Let’s just say that this film had much potential in it’s plot and how it’s initially set-up. The character of Pastor Abin Cooper and his flock was definitely patterned after the Westboro Baptist Church led by Fred Phelps who’re infamous for picketing funerals of soldiers and for being outright homophobic in their teachings and ideology. The ATF group with Keenan in command looks to be set-up to represent the Federal government and it’s police agencies run amok in their attempt to fight terrorism since Sept. 11, 2001. Then Smith drops in three horny teenage boys in the mix and it sure must’ve read like a surefire story with horror and action.
What we get instead was a film which didn’t seem to know how to proceed with the initial set-up. The film began and played out like something similar to Hostel and films of a similar vein. Unsuspecting teens lured by sex to be made an example of by a group of people extreme in their passions and ideas. If the film had continued with just those two groups as the core of the film’s story then it could’ve made for a decent survival horror film, but the addition of the ATF task force and how they impacted the dynamics between the congregation and the teens unbalanced everything. Now what was suppose to be a horror film turned into an action-drama.
The performances by the cast was also inconsistent. This could be due to the weakness of the screenplay which tried too hard to push Cooper and his people as batshit crazy through overly long sermons. Sermons by Abin Cooper that was delivered by Michael Parks in convincing fashion at times and then mumbled incoherently at others. The three teens were also a problem in that they weren’t sympathetic by any means. Even knowing what awaited them didn’t lessen the fact that these three teens were obnoxious and vulgar to the point that we didn’t care if Cooper and his people tortured and killed them.
One would expect that the addition of John Goodman as the ATF special agent and Kevin Pollak as his assistant would at least bring some serious acting chops to the proceedings, but their characters were so thinly-written and their dialogue so forced that one couldn’t believe them as real characters. It’s a shame that the film’s overall screenplay couldn’t provide the necessary foundation for a cast that had a very good veteran ensemble which included Melissa Leo, James Parks and Stephen Root.
Red State really failed in the very thing that was suppose to make this film the beginning of a shift in Kevin Smith’s career. It failed as a horror film in the most general sense. There was never any true feeling of horror to be had throughout the film. Even the first death of an unnamed homosexual kidnapped by the congregation to be used as an example during one of Cooper’s sermons failed to elicit any form of horror. This was a film which had much potential for some horrific sequences but it never explored it. The film doesn’t even work as a thriller which would be the closest this film ever got to be. Even the ending of the film which tried to inject a semblance of the supernatural didn’t even work as it turned out to be a major bait-and-switch that didn’t come off as creative once it was explained.
Does the film justify some of the venom hurled at it from Kevin Smith’s detractors?
I would say no in that the film wasn’t the worst thing he has made by a long shot. It did have some moments that hinted at something special could’ve been made if someone else was involved or if the film had more time to be worked on. I do believe that if Red State was made by anyone else other than Kevin Smith it would be considered average to good. But having such a polarizing figure as it’s creator and marketer might have blinded some in actually watching this film with an open-mind.
Does this mean Red State was actually a good film?
I would say no with the reasoning I’ve mentioned above. But I will say that the film wasn’t dull or boring. As unnecessary as the ATF task force to the story as a whole their arrival and the subsequent reaction of the congregation to them made for some exciting few minutes. Even Michael Park’s performance was quite good despite some of his line deliveries coming off as incoherent mumblings.
If Red State was to be Kevin Smith’s attempt to try and move away from his history of making comedies then it was a failed one. While it was a failure I wouldn’t mind him going back to the genre to hone his skills in doing more horror. If Uwe Boll could continue making even worst materials then surely Smith could be given another chance to make another and fix the very things which he did wrong with Red State with another horror film project. One thing for sure he would not be lacking in actors wanting to work with him.
Apparently, the Rapture was scheduled for yesterday and I missed it. Now, I suppose there are a lot of reasons as to why I might have been left behind but quite frankly, I blame my first boyfriend. Seriously, thanks for condemning me to three and a half years of tribulation, jerk! Anyway, as long as we’re all stuck together, why not enjoy six more of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation trailers? Since it’s still October, I’m continuing my horror theme with this entry. Plus, considering what the future holds for us, we should probably start getting used to a little horror…
Agck! I just recently saw this movie and that little raft scene totally freaked me out! I would never get on a raft to begin with because it worries me that I might end up with some raftmate who keeps going, “Row! Row! Row!” On another note, what’s up with those people who are always like, “Go! Go! Go!” in action scenes? I’m just like, “Okay, fascist much?” I mean, if you want to be all Mad Men-like, go watch AMC.
Three quick notes: 1) Watch carefully and you’ll see George Clooney pop up for about five seconds in this trailer, 2) if you don’t want people like getting killed at your school, don’t name it Horror, and 3) I made my sister watch this trailer and she assures me that a literal skeleton would never be allowed to become a cheerleader.
I assume this is where you go if you survive Horror High. Usually I try to be kinda coy and funny about these things but this time I’m just going to flat-out say it: Based on this, this film appears to truly suck. But I can’t resist a trailer that features melodramatic narration….
Okay, this movie also looks terrible but check out the so-bad-its-going-t0-make-you-kill-someone musical score. Again, I’d just like to point out that if this high school had simply been named after a dead president, a lot of needless death could have been avoided. But no, they had to go with Slaughter High.
As if I needed further proof to make my case, check out this trailer for Hell High. I own this movie on DVD and I have to admit that I bought it solely because of the name.
After those last few trailers, you may be ready for a trailer of a film that’s actually kinda sorta good. So, here’s one for David Cronenberg’s Videodrome, which is one of the weirdest films I’ve ever seen, what with all that “new flesh” talk and James Woods’ body doing weird things…agck!
When me and my sister first moved into our house last year, I was so excited to see that we had a loft. In fact, the day we moved in, I told her, “The loft is mine.” Yes, I had it all worked out. The loft would be my little office/art studio. I would sit up there with a little candle going and I’d write my poetry and read my books and compose my thoughts. Whenever the real world got to be too much for my poor little head, I would go up to the loft and I would find peace and quiet. That loft would be my sanctuary, my little world of fantasy where everything was fine.
That night, I lowered down the ladder that led up into the loft and I started to climb. If you know how terrified I am of both heights and ladder then you’ll understand just how difficult that was for me to do. Seriously, with each step up the ladder, my heart beat just a little faster and I could hear my own breathing growing more and more ragged. My feet felt so heavy and I had to stop several times so I could rest on the ladder and catch my breath. At one point, Erin came out of her room and stared at me clinging onto the 7-step ladder.
“Lisa Marie,” she asked, “what the Hell are you doing?”
“The loft will be mine!” I snapped back.
Summoning up all of my courage and determination, I forced myself to move up the remaining two steps of the ladder and popped my head up into the loft.
“YAY!” I declared.
That’s when I saw the world’s biggest, most evil-looking spider hanging about two inches from the tip of my nose.
“AGCK!” I shouted as I fell backward from the ladder and ended up falling flat on my ass on the floor below.
I haven’t been back in the loft since. Erin’s been up there a few times and she swears to me that she’s sprayed all sorts of sprays and cleaned out all sorts of dust but I don’t care. I may not be the smartest girl out there but I do know that when you find something really scary in a room, you lock up that and never enter it again.
I found myself thinking about that loft and the spider within earlier today while I was sitting through Paranormal Activity 3.
Paranormal Activity 3 is the latest installment in the franchise of films about dumb men who, once they discover that there’s an evil ghost stalking the women in their lives, respond by not leaving the house but instead sitting up video cameras so they can record their eventual deaths. This time the action is set up as a prequel to the first film but essentially, it’s the exact same film that you’ve seen twice before (though, this time, the filmmakers rip-off the end of the Last Exorcism as well).
Still, as far as the Paranormal Activity franchise goes, the third is probably the best of the series, if just because Micah’s not in this installment. Instead, Micah’s role is taken by Dennis (Christopher Nicholas Smith), who is the somewhat goofy but well-meaning stepfather of Katie and Kristi (who, of course, will eventually grow up to the focus of the first and second Paranormal Activity films). It turns out that Dennis is something of an aspiring filmmaker and hence, it makes a little bit more sense why he insists on setting up cameras once it becomes apparent that his house is haunted. Anyway, the movie pretty much recycles all of the shocks and scares that you expect from a Paranormal Activity film. There’s countless shots of people sleeping, dark shadows appearing in corners, and the whole thing where one person stands perfectly still for 5 hours. The scares are effective because, quite frankly, mysterious shadows are always going to be scary and at their rare best, the Paranormal Activity films manage to tap into that very primal, basic fear. Unfortunately, the Paranormal Activity films also have a tendency to drag in-between scares and this third installment is no different. That said, the film’s finale is well-done, if predictable.
However, in the end, it’s simply impossible to watch Paranormal Activity 3 and not wonder what I’ve wondered during every Paranormal Activity film: why doesn’t anyone ever just leave the damn house? Seriously, if you think I overreacted to seeing a spider up in the loft, you should see me when I run into a ghost hanging out in the kitchen.
As I’ve mentioned before, Dario Argento’s Suspiria is one of my favorite horror films and any quick search around the Internet will reveal that I’m hardly alone in that. There’s a lot of reasons why Suspiria remains so popular: there’s Goblin’s iconic score, Jessica Harper’s performance in the lead role, and Dario Argento at the peak of his powers.
While most critics and fans always cite the film’s infamous “window scene” as its most effective set piece, I happen to think that the scene below is actually a bit more effective. While it’s certainly more low-key than some of the film’s other death scenes, this scene is the one that still leaves me uneasy no matter how many times I see it. Maybe it’s the way that Argento isolates the blind pianist in the middle of the square or perhaps it’s the way that he positions the camera in order to keep the audience uncertain of where exactly the true threat is coming from.
Then again, it could just be because I’m scared of dogs in general…
So, last night, we finally got a proper storm here in Texas and wow, was I happy! Quite frankly, it’s not October unless you’ve got thunder, lightening, and howling wind. Of course, I also ended up getting caught out in the middle of it all and ended up getting soaked just from running from my car to the front door of my house. Seriously, it’s amazing how quickly your life can turn into a wet t-shirt contest. (Once I got inside, I did what anyone would do and jumped on twitter so I could tell everyone I was soaked. “OMG, I’m so wet!” I tweeted, with the most innocent of intentions.) Anyway, as I dried off, I watched The Boogeymanoff of Fearnet. No, I’m not talking about The Boogeyman that starred the oldest son from Seventh Heaven. No, The Boogeyman I watched is a genuinely weird little artifact from 1980 and it was directed by the infamous Ulli Lommel.
A hybrid of Halloween, the Exorcist, and probably every other horror film that had been released up to 1980, The Boogeyman opens up with siblings Willy and Lacey spying on their mother having sex with her creepy boyfriend who is wearing a nylon stocking over his face. So, naturally, Willy grabs a butcher knife and stabs the man to death. This act of violence is reflected in the bedroom mirror and, not surprisingly, this leads to the dead boyfriend’s evil spirit getting trapped in the mirror. Or maybe it’s just the evil of the act itself. Or maybe it’s … well, there’s a lot of possibilities and it’s hard not to consider them all because the film considers none of them, beyond the fact that the dead boyfriend is still in the mirror (which, let’s give credit where credit is due, is actually a pretty neat idea for a horror film).
Anyway, we jump forward 20 years and now, the brother and sister have grown up. They both live on a farm with their judgmental, self-righteous, ballet-hating aunt and uncle. (Okay, I’m projecting a little here because I have relatives who remind me of both of these characters and I always hated having to spend any time with them over the summer because I always knew they’d be all like, “Look at us, we’re farm folk, we’re better than you and who needs books or ballet when you got foul-smelling chickens and cows that’ll kick you in the face just because they feel like it…” Seriously.) Willy (now played by Nicholas Love) has been mute since the day he brutally butchered his mother’s boyfriend and oddly enough, no one seems to be disturbed by the fact that he’s a murderer. (“He’s a good boy,” his uncle says at one point, “I just wish he could talk.”) Lacey (played by Suzanna Love) is married to Jake Scully (Ron James) and they have a son. Judging from the uniform he’s wearing when he’s first introduced, Jake is apparently some sort of law enforcement guy. He’s also a total and complete chauvinistic toadsucker who (though it’s never acknowledged in the film) is pretty much responsible for every terrible thing that’s about to happen.
Lacey is suffering from intense nightmares (the nightmare sequence, by the way, is one of the film’s genuinely disturbing moments) and she keeps waking everyone up at night with her screams. Well, of course, Jake can’t have this because they’re farm folk, after all! So, Jake has to act like a man about it and chastises Lacey for not suppressing her feelings. When that doesn’t work, he drags her off to a therapist. This would seem like a good idea except for the fact that the only therapist in their little rural community appears to be John Carradine. Carradine grimaces through his three scenes, tells Lacey that she should go back to her childhood home and see that it’s just a normal house despite its history of brutal murder, and then leaves to collect his paycheck.
Lacey says she doesn’t want to go back to the house where the most Hellish thing ever occurred. Jake tells her that she’s being silly and that she’s going to go relive the worst event of her life whether she wants to or not. Seriously, Jake sucks.
So, Jake drags Lacey back to her childhood home. The house is now inhabited by two teenage sisters and their obnoxious little brother who spends his time running around and screaming, “Boogeyman!” at random. He’s kind of a brat but don’t worry — he eventually yells “Boogeyman!” one too many times and ends up getting his neck crushed by a falling window. That scene, by the way, genuinely shocked me because you just don’t expect to see little kids dispatched so graphically. But he really kinda deserved it, if just to keep him from growing up to be like Jake.
But before the little boy gets killed, we get to watch Lacey and Jake wander through the house. It turns out that, even though the house has changed owners, the exact same mirror is still hanging in the bedroom. Lacey looks at the mirror, sees her mother’s dead boyfriend’s reflection, and proceeds to shatter the mirror into a hundred pieces. Jake replies that she’s being silly and proceeds to put almost all the broken shards of the evil mirror into a paper bag so he can take them back to the farm with him. Why? Well, because he’s Jake so anything he does must be right…
Of course, by bringing the mirror to the farm (and then deciding to put it back together — really, Jake?), Jake has also brought the evil spirit of the dead boyfriend with him as well. Once again, Jake sucks. Though, in his defense, Lacey was having nightmares and Willy nearly strangled a neighbor girl, before John Carradine even suggested going to the house. And mom’s dead boyfriend liked to wear a stocking over his head but was he really evil? After all, he’s the one who ended up getting stabbed to death…well, regardless, now people start dying and eventually a priest has to come up to the house and try to remember the final scene of the Exorcist. So, thanks a lot, Jake!
The Boogeyman is one of those odd films that always seems to pop up on TV and hidden away in various DVD horror compilations. Through no fault of my own, I’ve actually seen it a handful of times and every time, I’ve discovered something else that doesn’t really work. The last time I watched it, I found myself concentrating on just how unconvincing all the actors (with the exception of Suzanna and Nicholas Love) were.* Slowly but surely, I found myself growing obsessed with actor Ron James, who played Lacey’s husband with all the style and charisma of a cardboard cut-out. (Of course, it doesn’t help that James was playing a character who, to put it charitably, is kind of a sexist pig. “C’mon, Lacey, cheer up!” he says as he forces her to visit the house where the most traumatic event of her childhood occurred.) Whenever the movie hit one of its many slow spots, I asked myself, “I wonder if Ron James gave up during the first day of shooting or the second?”
And yet, oddly, this is a film that’s stuck with me. The film has an effectively Southern gothic atmosphere to it and even the stiff performances and unnatural dialogue help to give the film a certain dream-like atmosphere. I know quite a few people who argue that Ulli Lommel is the worst director of all time** but he actually comes up with some effectively surreal and disturbing images. The sight of the dead boyfriend, with a nylon stocking pulled down of her face, suddenly staring at Lacey from the mirror is genuinely frightening, as is Lacey’s nightmare in which she’s bound and gagged by a knife-wielding assailant. The idea of mirrors storing everything that they witness is an intriguing one and there’s a nicely surreal sequence in which poor, mute Willy paints over every reflective surface he can find. Whether by intentional design or not, these flashes of genuine fright and oddness are all the more effective because they’re surrounded by such mundane material. The end result is a film that’s either brilliant or terrible depending on which point you actually start watching it.
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* Actually, the Loves were pretty bad too.
**By the way, the worst director of all time is Rod “Straw Dogs” Lurie.
Tonight, as I watched the premiere of The Walking Dead’s 2nd season, I found myself thinking about some of my favorite zombie films. One which came to mind immediately was Ken Wiederhorn’s low-budget but effectively disturbing 1977 film, Shock Waves.
In Shock Waves, a group of tourists find themselves shipwrecked off the Florida coast. As they wander through the isolated, swampy terrain, they happen to come across a decaying mansion that is inhabited by one very mad scientist (Peter Cushing). It turns out that Cushing is a Nazi war criminal who, during World War II, created the Death Corps., an elite unit of zombie super soldiers. As World War II came to an end, Cushing somehow ended up in Florida and, unfortunately for the living, he brought the Death Corps. with him. And now, with the arrival of the castaways, the Death Corps. has reawakened…
Shock Waves is considered by many (like me, for instance) to be the best example of the small genre of film known as the Nazi Zombie film. (Though I have to admit that it’s not my favorite Nazi zombie film. That honor would have to go to Jean Rollin’s delightfully weird Zombie Lake. For another example of the genre, check out Arleigh’s review of Dead Snow.) Admittedly, once you get past the idea of underwater zombies, the film is pretty predictable plot-wise. But a certain predictability goes along with any zombie film. One reason why zombies are so scary is the very fact that they are very simple and predictable. Zombies exist solely to destroy and, beyond running and hiding, there’s not a whole lot of options available for dealing with them. Vampires and werewolves are almost ludicrously vulnerable to all sorts of defensive moves (seriously, people, how difficult is it to wear a crucifix around your neck?) but zombies are pretty much an unstoppable force and for a zombie film to succeed, the zombies must truly seem unstoppable. This is where Shock Waves truly succeeds because seriously, these zombies are brutal. There’s a lengthy montage where the zombies literally tear apart a building, searching for the castaways and it’s probably one of the most chilling sequences of destruction ever caught on film. It helps that these Nazi zombies are truly frightening to look at, with their hair plastered to the sides of emotionless faces and their eyes hidden behind dark goggles. Add to that, they’re Nazis. Seriously, nothing’s scarier than Nazis. Perhaps the most enduring image from this film is of the members of the Death Corp. emerging from the water, one after another. It’s a remarkable sequence and probably one of the most striking “zombie mob” scenes ever.
The Shock Waves DVD also features an audio commentary with director Ken Wiederhorn and a few other crew members. It’s actually probably one of the more interesting DVD commentaries I’ve ever heard, as Wiederhorn is very honest about not being happy with how the final film turned out. And certainly, this is one of those low budget B-films that you can pick to death. As Wiederhorn himself points out, lead actress Brooke Adams often seems to just be going through the motions and, as effective as the Nazi zombies are, the film never explains how 1) they ended up off the coast of Florida or 2) how they haven’t been discovered before this. But so what? Shock Waves is one of those films that manages to be quite a bit more than the sum of its parts. Wiederhorn might not be happy with the film but that doesn’t change the fact that he manages to create a true sense of menace and danger during the film’s first half and the second half features some of the scariest zombies ever. Ultimately, Shock Waves is a genuinely scary and effective zombie film and one that the director has every right to be proud of.
One final note — Shock Waves opens up with one of those “This film might be based on a true story” narrations and it’s all the better for it. I’m including a clip of it below because 1) it’s just so grindhouse that I can’t help but love it and 2) it also features a bit of the film’s brutally effective score.
Tamara was a good entertaining horror/teenage angst movie in the same vein as De Palma’s Carrie and pretty much most of the teenage revenge/slasher flicks of the late 70’s and early 80’s. Such horror films involved the high school jocks and popular cliques getting their comeuppance by way of the nerdy student who has had enough. This time around the nerd in question is one Tamara whose shy, bookish and frumpy nature makes her an easy mark for every other kid in school.
Newcomer and extremely hot Jenna Dewan plays the title role and she does a very good job pulling off the dual personality role the film requires from her. The first half of the film has Dewan as very believable as the mousy and nerdy student whose low self-esteem adds to keeping her ostracized from the rest of the student population. It doesn’t help that she begins to misread one of her teacher’s (played by Matthew Marsden) attempts to help her as some sort of loving attention she so craves. There’s a small bit of a bright side to her daily existence in the form Chloe (played by Katie Stuart), she of the popular girl with a heart-of-gold role. Tamara’s life soon turns for the worst as her attempts to show her love for her helpful teacher gets rebuffed and her published article about drug-use in athletics puts her in the crosshairs of a couple of jocks with much to lose.
Typical of such teenage revenge horror films, the cruel jocks and popular kids concoct a plan to humiliate and embarrass Tamara, but just like those past films their plans backfire and the target of their plans gets killed during the the prank. The filmmaker really don’t add something new to this tried and tested formula. Instead of calling for the authorities to report the accidental death of their schoolmate, the kids decide, through the bullying by the alpha-male in the group, to bury Tamra instead and forget anything ever happened. This plan probably would’ve worked if Tamara wasn’t dabbling in witchcraft as ostracized teenagers are wont to do. Tamara’s spell prior to the prank to spellbind her teacher backfires as its activated by the spilling of her blood and to the surprise of the students who did her harm she returns alive, healthy and completely different the start of the new school week.
To say that Tamara returns utterly different in more ways than one would be an understatement. Ms. Dewan does a vampy, sometimes campy, job portraying the new and improved Tamara. Dewan goes from nerdy, plain-jane Tamara to ultra-sexy, barely there skirt wearing teen seductress whose touch does more than seduce those she has targeted for revenge. Jenna Dewan as the reborn Tamara steams up the screen with her overt sexuality and she practically saves the film from just being an ok, by-the-numbers horror film. Tamara was Ms. Dewan’s film from beginning to end and she does a very good job of keeping the story interesting even if it meant just being on the screen.
This film doesn’t break new ground in the realm of teen horror. In fact, it’s a mish-mash of alot of past teen horror flicks of the past that one could see the many influences in its story. Tamara was part Carrie, Black Christmas, The Craft and, more recently, Diablo Cody’s Jennifer’s Body. The direction was adequate at best and that’s really all one could hope for in a genre film like Tamara. What makes this film entertaining and worth watching was the joy of discovering the new scream queen talent in Jenna Dewan. Tamara might not be a great horror film, but Ms. Dewan sure more than tries to make it more than it’s B-movie pedigree.
Michael Wadleigh’s Wolfen (1981) remains one of my favorite stories with wolves, though there are no actual werewolves in the movie. It’s a great and underrated film, though I’m not quite sure if it really can be considered Horror. There’s bloodshed, yes, but not a lot when compared to the more superior The Howling, which came out in the same year.
The film in a nutshell is that you have the Bronx. Back in the late 70’s and early 80’s, the Bronx was a warzone, and there were a number of films showcasing the decay of the area (Nighthawks and Fort Apache: The Bronx are two good ones). When a real estate mogul who’s developing buildings in the area and his wife are brutally murdered, Detective Dewey Wilson (Albert Finney) is partnered with a terrorism expert (Diane Venora) to solve the crime.
Through the film, Dewey discovers that the murders are being done not by people, but the spirits of ancient indians in the form of Wolves – or better to say that they were hunters from an older time. The Wolfen, as they’re called, are scavengers of the city’s decay, feeding off of those who won’t be missed – derelicts and the like.
While Finney and Venora carry the film, Gregory Hines has some fun lines as the local NYPD mortician and Tom Noonan’s Wolf Expert was interesting, though a little strange. The best person in the supporting cast (who doesn’t have as much time to work with) is Edward James Olmos, in a surprising turn as Eddie, who is believed to have something to do with the murders, but later helps put Dewey in the right direction.
Supposedly, the movie was a little heavy handed with all of the anti-terror angle they tried to use. From what I’ve read, it wasn’t a major part of Whitley Streiber’s novel of the same name and it tends to steer the audience away from the actual problem. I mean, the audience is seeing wolves do this (or at least are seeing something animalistic do it), so to bring in the notion that there’s a terrorist plot involved kind of went over my head. The movie would have been tighter without it, I believe anyway.
One of the cooler elements of the movie is that you are able to see things through the eyes of the Wolfen themselves in an infrared vision style. While this was done with movies after it like Predator, and films before it like Westworld, Wolfen was my first experience with the effect. That, coupled with James Horner’s score (a mixture of themes you’d later find in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Aliens), lend to some of the style. Unfortunately, Wolfen is a somewhat difficult film to find in terms of obtaining the DVD for it, but the film has been on Netflix. If you have a chance to catch it, it’s an interesting watch.
