The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: The Yesterday Machine (dir by Russ Marker)

Posted on October 7, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1965 film The Yesterday Machine opens with dancing!

Well, okay, actually, it opens with two college students out in the middle of nowhere, listening to an old radio. Howie Ellison (Jay Ramsey) is working on his car, trying to get the engine to work again. Margie de Mar (Linda Jenkins) is working on her baton twirling, as one tends to due when stuck out in the middle of nowhere.

As soon as the film started and I got one look at the barren landscape, I knew that it had to have been filmed in my part of the world. The whole thing just screamed Texas/Oklahoma border. Then I saw Margie’s boots and then I heard Howie and Margie’s accents and I yelled, “OH MY GOD, THEY FILMED THIS IN TEXAS!”

And, indeed, they did. The Yesterday Machine is a regional production, through and through. Nearly everyone in the film has a strong accent and the North Texas landscape is notably flat. (The film’s harsh black-and-white cinematography actually gives it something of a apocalyptic feel.) After I watched this film, I did some research and I discovered that this film was shot in Dallas. Director Russ Marker was a Texas filmmaker and actor. He apparently directed two films over the course of his short career, this and The Demon From Devil’s Lake. He also had an uncredited role as a bank guard in Bonnie and Clyde.

(There were actually quite a few low-budget filmmakers working in Texas in the 60s. The best-known, of course, would probably be Larry Buchanan. But, at the same time that Russ Marker was shooting this film, Hal Warren was filming Manos: The Hands of Fear.)

Anyway, Howie and Margie are supposed to be heading to a college football game but it turns out that Howie is totally useless when it comes to fixing cars. So, instead, they leave the car and go looking for help. After wandering around for a bit, they run into some soldiers who are dressed in Confederate army uniforms.

“Those are some crazy threads, Dad!” Howie says.

Having no respect for Howie’s beatnik ways, the soldiers shoot him and then kidnap Margie.

What’s going on, you may ask. Well, fear not! Lt. Partane (Tim Holt) is on the case! And yes, classic film fans, you read that actor’s name correctly. Tim Holt, star of both The Magnificent Ambersons and Treasure of the Sierra Madre, lends his gravitas to The Yesterday Machine! According to the imdb, Holt grew disillusioned with Hollywood in the 50s and gave up the movies, retiring to his ranch in Oklahoma. He only came out of retirement to play Lt. Partane in this film and Agent Clark in Herschell Gordon Lewis’s moonshiner epic, This Stuff’ll Kill You. According to imdb, Holt only came out of retirement as a “favor for his friends.” So, in other words, Tim Holt probably did this movie to be nice.

Helping out Lt. Partane is a reporter named Jim Crandall (James Britton) and Margie’s sister, a singer named Sandy (Ann Pelligrino). Working together, they investigate why Confederate soldiers are wandering around North Texas and what they discover is that it’s because a fugitive Nazi scientist, Dr. Blake (Charles Young), has built a time machine! He’s planning on using it to go to the past and help Hitler win World War II!

However, before he does that, he wants to make sure that everyone knows how time travel works. This leads to a — I kid you not, dear readers — TEN MINUTE LECTURE IN FRONT OF A BLACKBOARD, during which Dr. Blake goes into meticulous detail about how he can travel in time! It’s interesting because you can tell that the filmmakers actually did go to the trouble of researching all of the theories about how time works and how man might be able to travel into the past and it’s also obvious that they really wanted to show off what they had learned.

But, here’s the thing. It’s totally unnecessary. We’ve already seen the Confederate soldiers. If we’re still watching the film by the time that Dr. Blake shows up then it’s safe to assume that we’ve suspended our disbelief enough to accept that time travel is possible. There’s no need to convince us. And, since Young wasn’t exactly the best actor in Texas, having him spend ten minutes madly lecturing the audience wasn’t exactly going to convince anyone that time travel was a plausible reality. Instead, it just brings the entire film to a halt and kills the small amount of narrative momentum that it had going for it.

Anyway, once Dr. Blake finally shuts up, it’s time to stop his nefarious plans and hopefully make the world safe for college football games.

The Yesterday Machine is a really bad movie but I have to admit that I always kind of enjoy watching these regional oddities. There’s something touching about everyone’s attempt to turn The Yesterday Machine into a “real” movie and, at its best, the film features the type of enthusiasm that you can only get from a low-budget amateur production. If nothing else, this movie about time travel is a real time capsule. Movies like this are about as close to real time machine as we’ll ever get.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Night School (dir by Ken Hughes)

Posted on October 6, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Someone is decapitating women in Boston and police Lt. Judd Austin (Leonard Mann) is determined to discover where the killer’s head is at!

The victims seem to come from all walks of life. A teacher’s aide loses her head while spinning around on a carousel. A worker at the local aquarium has her head tossed into a fish tank where it’s promptly nibbled at by a turtle. (Interestingly enough, the sharks ignore it.) Another head shows up in a kitchen and then another one in a toilet and then another one in a pond and …. well, you get the idea. There’s a lot of heads rolling around. The only thing that all of the victims have in common is Wendell College. Some were merely killed near the college. Others were enrolled in night classes.

Because the murderer wears a motorcycle helmet and a full black leather bodysuit, we’re not sure who the killer is. However, Lt. Austin promptly comes to the conclusion that the murderer is probably anthropology professor Vincent Millett (Drew Snyder), an unlikely lothario who is notorious for sleeping with his students and who has a collection of skulls in his apartment. Austin’s attitude is that no normal person would teach anthropology and since it also stands to reason that no normal person would run around Boston chopping off people’s heads, Millett must be the murderer. Millett doesn’t help himself by continually coming across as being a bit of an arrogant prick.

But is Millett the murderer? There are other suspects!

For instance, there’s Millett’s teaching assistant (and lover) Eleanor Adjai (Rachel Ward), on whom Millett performs some sort of odd blood ritual while the two of them are taking a shower together, the better so that director Ken Hughes can toss in a playful homage to Psycho.

And then there’s Gary (Bill McCann), the obviously disturbed busboy at the local diner who tries to follow Eleanor home one night.

And let’s not forget the dean of students, Helene (Annette Miller), who is portrayed as being a predatory lesbian because this movie was made in 1981.

And then there’s….

Well, actually, that’s it. One of the problems with Night School is there there really aren’t enough suspects. For a film like this to really work, you need a lot more red herrings. Savvy filmgoers already know that the most likely suspect isn’t going to be guilty because they never are. Unfortunately, that wipes out 50% of Night School‘s suspects and only leaves two others, one of whom is soon murdered. It all leads up to a surprise ending that’s not much of a surprise.

Night School is usually described as being a part of the slasher boom of the early 80s. While it’s true that Night School probably would never have been made if not for the financial success of Halloween and Friday the 13th, the film itself, with its whodunit plot and it’s gloved and masked killer, is more an American giallo than a traditional slasher film. That said, Night School never reaches the over-the-top, operatic heights of an Italian giallo. Instead, it’s a rather subdued version of the genre, happy to efficiently do it’s job without getting too caught up in issues of guilt, sin, and absolution. At the same time, some of the murders are cleverly staged and Rachel Ward brings some class to a film that could obviously use it. Night School gets the job done, even if it’s ultimately not that memorable.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: The Ghastly Ones (dir by Andy Milligan)

Posted on October 5, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

A young couple — both of whom are dressed in clothes that appear to come from the 1890s — enjoys a romantic and sunny excursion to an isolated island. Unfortunately, their day is ruined when they’re discovered by a buck-toothed hunchback named Colin (played by Hal Borske). Death and dismemberment follows.

Somewhere in New York, three sisters are informed that their father has died but that neither they nor their husbands can receive a cent of their inheritance until they fulfill one very specific requirement. According to their father’s impossibly elderly attorney (played by Neil Flanagan, who is made up to look like an old witch from a community theater production of MacBeth), the sisters and their husbands must spend three nights in their father’s mansion. Of course, the sisters agree.

Upon arriving at the mansion, they discover that the mansion is being looked after by two maids and a hunchbacked, buck-toothed handyman named …. COLIN! Within a few minutes of meeting everyone, Colin eats a live rabbit while everyone watches. Later the remains of the rabbit shows up in one of the sister’s bed, along with a note that reads, “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit!”

Speaking for myself, I would probably leave as soon as I saw the handyman eating a live rabbit. I mean, none of the sisters appear to be struggling financially but then again, greed is a powerful force. Instead, everyone settles in for their three-night stay, which leads to 1968-style sex scenes and a lot of footage of people sitting around and talking about nothing. For a low-budget grindhouse film, this is an extremely talky movie.

Anyway, eventually people start dying. Someone gets pitchforked. Another person is found hanging by his ankles. There’s a rather bloody disembowelment and someone else loses their head. Bloody X’es are left on doorways. Who is doing the killing? Hmmm …. well, Colin is the obvious suspect since we already saw him kill two people for absolutely no reason. But, it turns out that Colin has a little help. That’s right! The Ghastly Ones comes with a twist ending that you’ll see from miles away.

So, what exactly is The Ghastly Ones? It’s an extremely low-budget film, full of unlikable people dying in various grotesque ways. It’s an oddly moralistic film, with everyone dying because their greed prevents them from doing the sensible thing and leaving the house. It’s also apparently a period piece, with everyone dressed like they belong in the 1890s even though you can clearly hear the sound of cars in the background of a few scenes.

In short, this is another Andy Milligan film! Filmed on Staten Island and featuring a largely amateur cast (though one of the husbands is played by Richard Romanus, who went on to appear in Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets and has since had a respectable career as a character actor), The Ghastly Ones is just as bad and weirdly hypnotic as you would expect any Andy Milligan film to be. Milligan even makes a cameo of sorts in the film. Listen closely and you can occasionally hear him off-camera, feeding the actors their lines and, at one point, telling one of the sisters to “roll over.”

It’s a terrible movie and yet, it’s also strangely fascinating. I think that’s because Milligan’s ineptness was matched only by his anger and that anger (along with a lot of pressimism) courses through the entire film. Every frame of the film drips with Milligan’s sincere disdain for the greedy and selfish characters who appear throughout the movie and, as you watch, it becomes obvious that Milligan had more sympathy for Colin than for any of his victims. (Of course, two of Colin’s victims were just two innocent people in love who were trying to have a nice picnic so perhaps it’s for the best not to dwell too much on what that might mean.) Milligan directs this story with an intensity that doesn’t quite make up for the lack of talent involved but, at the very least, it does keep things vaguely interesting. “Who are the Ghastly Ones?” Andy Milligan seems to be asking. “We all are.”

By the way, between this and Guru, The Mad Monk, I have now watched two Andy Milligan films in one week. Pray for me.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: End of the World (dir by Charles Band)

Posted on October 4, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1977 film End of the World has got a great opening scene. An obviously distraught priest (played by none other than Christopher Lee!) steps into an isolated diner. He tells the counterman that he needs to use the phone. The counterman says, “Sure, father.” And then suddenly, everything in the dinner starts blowing up. The phone, the coffee, the pinball machine, everything explodes. The counterman ends up trying to unsuccessfully throw himself through a window. The priest, looking rather confused, steps outside of the diner and he runs into …. his exact double! Christopher Lee meets Christopher Lee!

Again, that’s a great opening and it’s really not a surprise that the rest of the film can’t live up to it. Once the two Christopher Lees disappear into the darkness, the focus of the story shifts to a scientist named Andrew (Kirk Scott) and his wife, Sylvia (Sue Lyon, who years previously played Lolita). Andrew spends a lot of time sitting in front of a boxy computer and staring at the screen. He’s picking up strange transmissions from space and he’s trying to translate them. Andrew goes home. He and his wife got a party. Andrew sits in front of the computer a while longer. Andrew goes home. Andrew goes to work. Andrew keeps staring at the computer….

“Wait,” you’re saying at this point, “isn’t this is a Christopher Lee movie?”

Yes, it is. Christopher Lee is indeed top-billed and he’s hardly in the movie at all. I’d like to think that, when asked why by an intrepid reporter why he agreed to star in End of the World, Lee laughed and replied, “For the money, of course.” But, according to Lee’s autobiography, he did the film because he was told that he would be appearing with a cast of distinguished actors like Jose Ferrer, Dean Jagger, and John Carradine. Now, Dean Jagger does have a small cameo in the film but Ferrer and Carradine are nowhere to be seen. Either they left the production or someone lied to Sir Christopher!

Anyway, back to the plot. Eventually, Andrew figures out that the space transmissions are predicting natural disasters. We don’t actually see any of these disasters because, after all, this is the end of the world on a very low budget. But we are assured that the disasters are happening. Andrew and Sylvia discover that the transmissions are coming from a convent in the middle of the desert. Andrew and Sylvia go to investigate and they discover that the nuns are….

ALIENS!

Now, this is actually a pretty good twist and there are some vaguely humorous scenes of the the nuns working in a space lab. It turns out that the nuns (and one of the Christopher Lees) are stranded on this planet because their spaceship broke down. They don’t really like Earth, considering it to be an ugly and polluted place. They’re planning on ending the world but they need to leave before the whole place blows up. They demand that Andrew help them fix their transporter and they’re going to hold Sylvia hostage until he does so….

It’s all a bit silly but, as you’re watching the film, you can’t help but wish that it had been even sillier. I mean, alien nuns and Father Christopher Lee? That sounds like the makings of a certain type of classic! But, unfortunately, the film never fully embraces the full potential of its absurdity. It takes forever for Andrew and Sylvia to actually reach that convent and even the alien nuns become rather passé after a few minutes. Christopher Lee is fun to watch as always and his character’s irritation with being stuck on Earth was obviously mirrored by Lee’s irritation with being in the film. And, despite all else, let’s give credit where credit it is due — the title lives up to its promise. The world may end in a pile of stock footage but an end is an end.

Anyway, this one is pretty much for Christopher Lee completists only. Watch the opening and then fast forward to the end.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Guru, The Mad Monk (dir by Andy Milligan)

Posted on October 3, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1970 film Guru, the Mad Monk opens with a woman being dragged, by two men, down a New York sidewalk. In the background, you can clearly hear the sounds of Manhattan morning traffic as people head to work or school, presumably barely noticing that a movie is being made one block over.

Now, normally, that might not be a problem. In fact, it’s the kind of things that you tend to expect from an independent film made in the early 70s. Cinema verite was all the rage back then and many films from that period would incorporate documentary techniques, shooting on location and making use of actual bystanders and the sound of actual traffic. However, Guru, the Mad Monk is supposed to be taking place on the isolated (and fictional) prison island of Mortavia. Even more importantly, it’s supposed to be taking place in 1480. Now, obviously, all historical films require a certain suspension of disbelief. I mean, we know that no cinematic version of the 15th Century is going to be a 100% accurate and we really should be happy about that because the the 1400s were a pretty disgusting time to be alive. I mean, we don’t need to see people tossing a chamber pot out of their bedroom window in order to accept that a film is taking place in a certain time period. However, what we do need is for there not to be two scenes that feature the sounds of cars driving by the film’s set. One half expects some random person to wander into the shot and hail a taxi.

Guru, the Mad Monk was directed by Andy Milligan, who is a legendary name as far as grindhouse filmmaking is concerned. Milligan was an off-off broadway playwright-turned-exploitation filmmaker who didn’t let a lack of money and/or discernible talent prevent him from directing an estimated 29 films. Milligan’s films are distinguished by angry (if usually incoherent) storylines, flamboyant performances from a stock company made up of local Staten Island actors, cheap gore effects, and poor sound quality. One reason why you especially notice the sound quality is because a typical Milligan film is surprisingly talky. It makes sense when you consider that Milligan developed his artistic vision while working in theater but, as a director, Milligan never seemed to figure out how to break free from the inherent stageyness of his scripts.

And yet, there’s also an odd and, at times, rather dream-like intensity to most of Milligan’s films. Some of that is undoubtedly due to the fact that a typical Milligan film lacks any sort of intentional humor. For instance, Guru features a supporting character named, believe it or not, Igor. And yes, Igor (played by Jack Spencer)) is a hunchback. And typically, you would think any filmmaker including a hunchback named Igor in a horror film made after 1940 would have to be having a little bit of fun with the cliches of the genre. But no, Guru, The Mad Monk was obviously meant to be a very serious film and very much a reflection of the negative worldview that seemed to permeate all of Milligan’s films. Guru, The Mad Monk is a dark film where almost everyone is corrupt and guilty of something and, watching the film, you get the feeling that its darkness is coming straight for Milligan’s heart.

Notice the white scooter in the background as these 15 century clergymen hold a meeting in Guru, The Mad Monk.

As for what the film’s about …. well, that’s hard to say. The plot is rather difficult to follow. Father Guru (played, in flamboyantly evil style, by Neil Flanagan) is the governor of the prison island of Mortavia. (St. Peter’s, an Episcopal Church in Manhattan, stands in for the prison.) Guru is usually quick to execute his prisoners so that his mistress, Lady Olga (Jacqueline Webb), can drink their blood. It’s hard to say whether Lady Olga is supposed to be a real vampire or not. When we first meet her, she just comes across as being a Lady Bathory-type but then there’s another scene where she appear to be wearing fake fangs and declares herself to be the “Soul of Darkness” so who knows for sure?

In between all of the eye gougings and beheadings that one would typically expect to find in a Milligan film, there’s also a love story as jailer Carl (Paul Lieber) falls in love with the latest prisoner, Nadja (Susan Israel). Nadja is due to be executed but Guru agrees to spare her life if Carl will dig up some bodies and sell them to a nearby university. Carl agrees but it soon turns out that he made a mistake trusting Father Guru. It all leads to the expected bloodbath, along with Guru raving about the joys of living a life where “I preach one thing but continue to believe another!”

Clocking in at just 57 minutes, it’s a weird film. Typically, I tend to defend films like this because, regardless of their flaws, they at least represent the director’s unique vision of the world. That’s always been my defense when it’s come to Ed Wood, for instance. But, when it comes to Milligan …. eh. I mean, from a historical perspective, anyone who is interested in classic grindhouse and independent filmmaking has to see at least one Andy Milligan film. And it can be said that you’ll never mistake an Andy Milligan film for anyone else’s. But, at the same time, I have to admit that watching Guru was the longest 57 minutes of my life.

So, no …. unless you’re on some sort of Andy Milligan kick, I don’t really recommend Guru, The Mad Monk.

Sorry, Igor.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Single White Female 2: The Psycho (dir by Keith Samples)

Posted on October 2, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

13 years after the release of the first Single White Female and a countless host of imitations, an official sequel was released straight-to-video in 2005. Subtitled “The Psycho,” (because apparently, Jennifer Jason Leigh was totally stable in the first film), Single White Female 2 tells the story of what happens when one roommate becomes obsessed with the other. It all leads to murder and sexual infidelity and sudden hairstyle changes.

Maybe you’re thinking that this sounds exactly like the first Single White Female. And, okay, there are some similarities. But just consider some of the differences!

1. In the first Single White Female, Jennifer Jason Leigh’s character grows obsessed with Bridget Fonda after moving into Fonda’s apartment. In Single White Female 2, Tess (played by Allison Lange) becomes obsessed with Holly (Kristen Miller) after Holly moves into Tess’s apartment. See, this time, the psycho has her name on the lease. HUGE DIFFERENCE!

2. In the first Single White Female, the plot is set in action after Bridget Fonda discovers that Steven Weber cheated on her. In the sequel, the plot is set in motion by Holly’s original roommate, Jan (Brooke Burns), seducing a client who Holly was also sleeping with. Again, that’s a huge difference and it also leads us to wonder if maybe Holly just sucks at choosing roommates.

3. In the first Single White Female, Jennifer Jason Leigh played an unstable bookstore employee. In the sequel, Tess is a nurse who has a history of killing people who she feels would be happier dead. In other words, Tess is a psycho with a mission.

4. In the first Single White Female, Jennifer Jason Leigh’s character hung out in a sleazy S&M club. In the sequel, Tess actually performs on stage.

5. The first Single White Female actually looked like a real movie whereas the sequel has the flat and rather bland look of a film shot for and on video.

6. In the first Single White Female, you could understand why an insecure person would want to steal Bridget Fonda’s identity. In the sequel, Holly’s identity doesn’t seem to be interesting enough to justify trying to steal.

7. In the first Single White Female, Jennifer Jason Leigh gave a performance that inspired both fear and sympathy. In the sequel, Tess is just your typical straight-to-video movie psycho. There’s no indication that she could have ever been anything other than a straight-to-video movie psycho.

8. The first Single White Female was a good film, almost despite itself. The sequel is rather dull.

So, I guess my point here is that, if you want to watch a movie about a roommate stealing someone’s identity and getting a new haircut, the first Single White Female is the one to go with. The sequel doesn’t really add anything worthwhile to the story, nor does it improve on it in any way. Give some credit to Brooke Burns, who plays Holly’s untrustworthy ex-roommate and who, at the very least, seems to understand the type of movie in which she’s appearing. Brooke Burns gets the worst lines but she at least seems to be having fun delivering them. Otherwise, it’s best just to forget about this sequel.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Fiend (dir by Don Dohler)

Posted on October 1, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1980 film, Fiend, is a movie that should be viewed by every aspiring indie filmmaker. I’m going to tell you why in a few paragraphs but first, allow me to tell you what Fiend is.

Fiend opens with ominous music and a shot of a seemingly deserted cemetery. While the camera tracks it’s way from headstone to headstone, we become aware of a red light that seems to be floating above the ground, as if it’s searching for something. The light suddenly plunges into a grave. A few seconds later, the man who was in the grave claws his way to the surface. Just one look at him reveals that he’s been dead for quite some time. However, you might be distracted from the facial decay by the fact that the man is glowing.

The man staggers about, eventually coming across a young woman who has been abandoned in the cemetery by her jerk of a boyfriend. The man grabs her from behind and wraps his hands around her neck. Briefly, the man’s glow seems to pulse and then it fades away. The man is no longer a decaying corpse. Now, he’s just a middle-aged guy with a huge mustache. He looks like he should be teaching a remedial math class.

(Perhaps not coincidentally, Don Leifert, the actor playing our living corpse, actually was a teacher.)

Now calling himself Eric Longfellow, the man moves into a nice house in the suburbs and establishes himself as a music instructor. Longfellow tends to keep to himself, which certainly makes the neighbors a bit curious about him. Longfellow would probably be more sociable if not for the fact that, every few days or so, he starts to decay. For that reason, he has to have a constant supply of victims so that he can suck out their life force and renew himself. Helping him out with this issue is Dennis Frye (played by George Stover, who was apparently a civil servant when he wasn’t acting), who is kind of squirmy and owns some of the ugliest suits ever tailored. (I assume that Dennis Frye’s name is an homage to Dwight Frye, who played Renfield in the Bela Lugosi-version of Dracula.)

Now, of course, you can only suck the life force out of so many people before people start to notice that something strange is going on. Longfellow is unfortunate enough to live next door to Gary Kender (Richard Nelson), who is a plain-spoken, beer-drinking guy who just happens to have a mustache that’s almost as huge as Longfellow’s. Gary doesn’t trust Longfellow so he starts to do some research on his mysterious new neighbor….

Now, here’s the thing to remember about Fiend. It was made foe $6,000. That would translate to about $18,000 today. Either way, it’s a tiny budget. And yet, it’s an effective (if occasionally goofy) little film and, more often that not, it’s effective precisely because it was shot for next to nothing. The grainy images give the film a feeling of immediacy. Though the majority of the murders may have happened in broad daylight because day is easier to light than night, all those daytime murders contribute to the sense of unease, the feeling that no one’s safe at any time. Even the amateur quality of the performances contribute to the film’s overall dream-like feel. Director Don Dohler may not have been able to afford expensive special effects or realistic gore but, as a result of that, his direction emphasizes atmosphere over jump scares. I mean, don’t get me wrong. This is definitely an amateur film, full of clunky dialogue and the occasional slow scene. But so what? Even those flaws add to the film’s nicely surreal atmosphere.

I mean, consider this. Don Dohler made this film nearly 40 years ago and he spent less money on the entire production than most films spend during one day of shooting. It was released in only a handful of theaters and I imagine it probably didn’t get rave reviews from the mainstream critics. And yet, here we are, decades later, and Fiend still has a growing cult of admirers. It’s available on YouTube and, if you do watch it, I encourage you to read the comments posted underneath the video. Several of them are from people who either worked on the film or who knew Don Dohler and Don Leifert. For the most part, everyone seems to have fond memories of both this film and the filmmakers.

Fiend works because, instead of surrendering to the film’s low budget, Don Dohler used it to his advantage. There’s a lesson there for us all.

The TSL’s Grindhouse: The Haunting of Sharon Tate (dir by Daniel Farrands)

Posted on June 17, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The Haunting of Sharon Tate is a frustrating film to review.

On the one hand, it’s an undeniably well-made horror film. It’s surprisingly well-paced. It creates an atmosphere of nonstop dread. It’s the type of movie that makes you keep an eye on the shadows in the room. This is the type of movie that makes your heart race and leaves you uneasy about every unexpected noise that you hear. It’s a dark and disturbing horror film and it features an excellent lead performance from Hillary Duff in the title role. While watching the film, you care about her and you don’t want anything bad to happen to her. That makes the film’s shocks and scares all the more frightening.

On the other hand, though, The Haunting of Sharon Tate features a premise that will leave even the most dedicated grindhouse horror fan feeling more than a bit icky.

The Haunting of Sharon Tate is hardly the first horror film to be based on the infamous Manson murders. In fact, it’s not even the only one to be released this year. We’re approaching the 50th anniversary of the Tate murders so last May saw the release of Charlie Says and Quentin Tarantino’s highly-anticipated Once Upon A Time In Hollywood is set to be released in July. What sets The Haunting of Sharon Tate apart from the other Manson films is that it’s told totally from the point-of-view of Manson’s victims. Manson is only seen briefly and the other members of his so-called “Family” wander through the movie like dead-eyed zombies. This is the rare Manson film that doesn’t try to portray that grubby little racist hippie as being some sort of outlaw folk hero and, regardless of what you think of the rest of the film, that’s definitely a good thing.

Instead, this movie focuses on Sharon Tate. The film opens with a black-and-white recreation of an interview that Sharon gave a year before her murder, in which she discusses whether or not dreams can tell the future. We then jump forward to August of 1969. Sharon is 8-months pregnant and staying at 10050 Cielo Drive. Her husband, Roman Polanski (who is kept off-screen for the entire movie), is in Europe. Staying with Sharon is her ex-boyfriend, Jay Sebring (Jonathan Bennett) and her friends, heiress Abigail Folger (played by real-life heiress Lydia Hearst) and Abigail’s boyfriend, Wojciech Frykowsky (Pawel Szajda). Also on the property is caretaker Steve Parent (Ryan Cargill), who is staying in a trailer and enjoys working on electronics.

(For the most part, the film sticks to the generally established facts when it comes to depicting the friendship between Sharon, Jay, Abigail, and Fykowsky. However, it takes a lot of liberties with its portrayal of Steve Parent. As opposed to how he’s portrayed in the film, Parent was actually an 18 year-old friend of the property’s caretaker who, because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, became the first victim of the Tate murders. By most accounts, he never met Sharon or any of the other inhabitants of the main house.)

In the film, Sharon is haunted by premonitions. She has dreams in which she sees her friends being murdered by feral human beings. She gets disturbing phone calls and she hears weird voices talking about someone named Charlie. Her friends keep telling her that the nightmares are just a result of the stress that she’s under but Sharon is convinced that they’re a warning. (Oddly, some of the scenes in which her friends dismiss her concerns are reminiscent of Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby.) After an hour of build up, the Family finally arrives at Ceilo Drive and, because of her dreams, Sharon is ready for them and able to fight back. Or is she? Can history be changed? the film asks, Or has our fate already been determined?

So, here’s the good thing about The Haunting of Sharon Tate: It’s clearly on Sharon’s side. It doesn’t glorify Manson and his family. Hilary Duff gives a touching and, at times, heart-breaking performance as Sharon Tate and the film holds her up as a symbol of hope, optimism, kindness, and everything else that was lost as a result of Manson’s crimes. The film itself is well-directed and genuinely scary and the final shot is haunting.

Here’s the bad thing about The Haunting of Sharon Tate: It may be well-made but it’s still exploiting a real-life tragedy, one in which six people lost their lives. (That’s not counting all of the other murders that Manson ordered.) To be honest, if the film was called The Haunting of Jessica Smith, I probably wouldn’t have any reservations about recommending it to horror fans. Instead, it’s called The Haunting of Sharon Tate and that makes it very hard to watch the film with a clear conscience. Do the film’s technical strengths make up for the film’s inherent ickiness? That’s the question that every viewer will have to ask and answer for themselves.

I will say this: I do think that The Haunting of Sharon Tate is a thousand times better than something like Wolves At The Door, in which Sharon was portrayed with all the depth of a Friday the 13th summer camp counselor. The Haunting of Sharon Tate left me feeling feeling frightened, disturbed, and, because of my struggle to reconcile the film’s technical strengths with its morally dubious premise, more than a little annoyed. It also left me mourning for Sharon Tate and every other victim of Manson and his brainwashed gang of zombies. Is the film a tribute to Sharon or a crass exploitation of her memory? At times, it seems to be both which is one reason why it’s such a frustrating film.

Well-made and problematic to the extreme, The Haunting of Sharon Tate is as close to a modern grindhouse film as we’re going to get in today’s antiseptic age. Whether or not that’s a good enough reason to sit through it is a question that each viewer will have to decide for themselves.

The TSL’s Grindhouse: Red Sonja (dir by Richard Fleischer)

Posted on March 31, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1985 film, Red Sonja, invites us to take a journey to a forgotten age, a time of a mythical kingdoms, evil sorcery, epic sword fights, and annoying little child kings who spent a lot of time shouting. It’s a time of wonder, danger, heroism, and, of course, Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Reportedly, the once and future governor of California has frequently named Red Sonja as being the worst film in which he ever appeared. When you consider some of the other films that have featured Gov. Schwarzenegger, that’s indeed a bold statement. In Red Sonja, Schwarzenegger plays Lord Kalidor. Interestingly enough, Lord Kalidor is absent for the majority of the film. He shows up briefly at the beginning of the film and then he vanishes for quite a bit of Red Sonja‘s 89-minute running time. Whenever Schwarzenegger does show up, he wears the smirk of a man who knows that he’s going to get paid a lot of money for doing very little actual work.

The majority of the film focuses on Sonja (Brigitte Nielsen), a warrior who lives in one of those vanished ages, perhaps after the War of the Rings but before the sinking of Atlantis. When we first see her, she’s being spoken to by what appears to be a puff of smoke, which is apparently meant to be some sort of warrior goddess. The puff of smoke fills tells Sonja about everything that happened to her before the start of the movie, though we never do learn why Sonja needs to be told her own backstory. After rejecting the sexual advances of the evil Queen Gedren (Sandahl Begman), Sonja was forced to watch as her parents and brother were murdered and then she was raped and left for the dead by the Gedren’s soldiers. The Goddess promises to make Sonja into a superior warrior, on the condition that Sonja agree to never have sex with a man unless that man can first beat her in fair combat. Sonja agrees and is sent off to get trained by the Grand Master. It’s kinda like Kill Bill, if Bill was a puff of smoke.

Jump forward to …. well, I’m not sure how many years pass. To be honest, it’s next to impossible to really discern any sort of coherent logic to the film’s narrative progression so let’s just give up on that. What’s important is that there’s this temple and, inside the temple, there’s a glowing green talisman. Apparently, the talisman created the world but now it needs to be carefully watched over before being destroyed. Only women are allowed to handle the talisman (Yay!) but they’re not allowed to destroy it unless directed by a man. (Booooo!) The temple priestesses are waiting for Lord Kalidor to arrive so that they can get rid of the talisman. However, Queen Gedren shows up first. Not only does she steal the talisman but she kills the priestesses as well.

One of the priestesses was Varna (Janet Agren, who you might recognize from Lucio Fulci’s City of the Living Dead). Varna just happens to be the sister of Sonja. (Sonja is now known as Red Sonja, because she had red hair. From now on, I want to be known as Red Lisa.) Now, Sonja has yet another reason to want to kill Gedren! Rejecting Kalidor’s help, Sonja heads off for revenge. Along the way, she meets an annoying child king named Tarn (Ernie Reyes, Jr.), who is upset that Gedren previously destroyed his kingdom. Despite hating him, Sonja allows Tarn and his guardian, Falkon (Paul L. Smith), to tag along with her. Despite not being an official member of the revenge party, Kalidor decides to follow after them because he wants to beat Red Sonja in fair combat, if you get what I mean.

Red Sonja is a spectacularly silly film. The dialogue is stilted. Even by the standards of the 1980s ,the special effects are poorly executed. This the type of film where the evil Queen nearly destroys the world not because she has any sort of grand scheme but instead, just because she’s evil and that’s what evil people do. Brigitte Nielsen delivers her lines with a forced solemnity while Schwarzenegger, Bergman, and the great Paul L. Smith seem to be struggling not to start laughing.

And yet, there’s a sneaky charm to be found in all of the silliness. For instance, when Sonja does finally reach the queen’s castle, she has to cross a bridge that appears to basically be the skeleton of giant rhinoceros. No none in the film seems to be surprised to come across a skeleton a giant rhinoceros and, to be honest, there’s no reason for it to be there. It’s just there and it’s so wonderfully out-of-place that it becomes rather fascinating. Add to that, while the portrayal of the evil lesbian queen is problematic in all sorts of ways, this is a film about a strong female warrior who doesn’t need a man to rescue her and that was probably even more rare in 1985 than it is today!

Watching Red Sonja, you get the feeling that nobody involved in the film took it all that seriously and that perhaps the best way to handle the movie is to just sit back and have a laugh. It’s dumb, it’s campy, it often makes no sense but, at the same time, it’s still a lot easier to follow than Game of Thrones. Like many bad films, it’s only bad if you watch it alone. Watch it with a group of your snarkiest friends and you’ll have a totally different experience.

6 Trailers For Christmas

Posted on December 25, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

It’s a holiday and you know what that means!

Or maybe you don’t. Sometimes, I forget that not everyone can read my mind. Anyway, I used to do a weekly post of my favorite grindhouse trailers. Eventually, it went from being a weekly thing to being an occasional thing, largely due to the fact that there’s only so many trailers available on YouTube. Now, Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Film Trailers is something that I usually bring out on a holiday.

Like today!

So, here are 6 trailers for the holiday season!

Christmas Evil (1980)

Believe it or not, this is actually a really good movie. In fact, it’s probably the best killer Santa movie ever made. The ending will blow your mind.