The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: A Name For Evil (dir by Bernard Girard)

Posted on October 5, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

So, this is an odd one.

First released in 1973 but reportedly filmed several years before, A Name For Evil tells the story of John Blake (Robert Culp) and his wife, Joanna (Samantha Eggar). John is a successful architect who lives in the big city. He used to be a passionate rebel but now he’s just a boring corporate man. Even his wife is bored with him. John knows that he has to make some changes. Since this movie was made in 1973, those changes start with throwing a TV out of a window.

(Trust me. If you watch enough films from the early 70s, you will see so many TVs get tossed through so many windows that it will no longer surprise you. Apparently, being a rebel in 1973 meant destroying a TV. According to Wikipedia, the top five TV shows in 1973 were, in order, All In The Family, Sanford and Son, Hawaii 5-0, Maude, and the NBC Sunday Night Mystery Movie. I choose to believe that the NBC Saturday Night Mystery Movie is what drove everyone over the edge. Anyway…)

Anyway, John decides to quit his high-paying job and instead move up to New England and live in his grandfather’s mansion. (His grandfather, by the way, was known as The Major.) Joanna is reluctant to accompany him and she’s even more upset when it turns out that 1) the house is a total wreck and 2) the last tenant died under mysterious circumstances.

John, however, grows somewhat obsessed with the house. This is despite the fact that John doesn’t seem to really like the house or the inhabitants of the nearby town that much. For instance, there’s a scene — which might be a dream — in which John crashes the funeral of a local boy who died in Vietnam and he starts to laugh uncontrollably when the minister praises the boy for sacrificing himself for his country. I think we’re supposed to like John during this scene but John laughs so long and so hard and he just keeps going and going that, by the end of it, I think even the most dedicated peace activist would look at him and say, “What an asshole.”

At the house, John keeps seeing strange shadows and hearing weird noises. Occasionally, he sees someone who looks like the long-dead Major riding a white horse. He hears voices coming from the walls and he accuses Joanna of being behind it. Joanna tells him that he’s being paranoid. Of course, Joanna herself is slowly coming to appreciate the house, especially after a ghost kisses her hand…

Suffering from ennui, John does what anyone in 1973 would do. He tracks down the local hippies and he takes part in a down-with-the-establishment orgy. Are the hippies real or are they figments of his imagination? Is the house real or is it a figment of John’s imagination? Is John real or is he just a figment of his imagination? A Name For Evil does not seem to really know but you can be sure that we’ll get another shot of that TV falling out of that window before the movie ends.

On the one hand, A Name For Evil is a standard haunted house/spiritual possession type of film. But, on the other hand, it’s obvious that A Name For Evil was trying to make some sort of grand statement about life in America in 1973. How else do you explain the hippies, the funeral scene, and that TV flying out the window? Robert Culp spends the entire movie so pissed off that there’s no way he wasn’t meant to be some sort of generational spokesman. It makes for a very strange, only-in-the-70s hybrid type of film.

Now, I should mention that I actually did a little research before writing this review. I discovered that A Name for Evil was originally produced by MGM but it spent years on the shelf until Penthouse (the magazine) bought the film and re-cut it for theatrical release. Apparently, the first version was clear about being an attempt at social satire with a little horror and nudity thrown in. The version that was actually released was edited to emphasize the horror and the nudity. That probably explains why the film feels like such a strange mishmash of genres and attitudes.

If you ever get the chance, I’d recommend watching A Name For Evil. It’s not that good but it’s just too strange not to watch.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: The Autopsy of Jane Doe (dir by André Øvredal)

Posted on October 4, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I have to admit that I’ve watched so many horror films that I’m sometimes tempted to get a little bit jaded about them.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the genre. I love watching horror movies. I love analyzing horror movies. I love writing about horror movies. It’s just that, after you’ve watched a few hundred of them, it becomes easier to pick up on all the little tricks. For instance, I now know not to worry whenever anyone hears a strange sound in the kitchen because it’s inevitably just going to be a cat in a cabinet. Instead, it’s only after the cat has run by and caused everyone to jump that you have to start worrying about something terrible to happen. I also know that there’s a good chance that the first chase scene is going to turn out to be an elaborate nightmare. As such, I sometimes I get cynical about whether or not I can really be frightened anymore.

But then I watch something like The Autopsy of Jane Doe.

I watched The Autopsy of Jane Doe back in Decemeber. It was two in the morning. I was alone in the house. It was raining outside. I was having trouble sleeping so, of course, I decided why not sit in the dark in my underwear and watch a horror movie? At the time, it didn’t occur to me that I was essentially putting myself in a classic horror movie situation. It was only later, when I was lying in bed with all the lights on and freaking out about every little noise that I heard that I realized my mistake.

The Autopsy of Jane Doe takes place in a morgue in a small town. The body of a woman has been brought in. It is believed that she died in a house fire but there are no signs of trauma on her body. Her finger prints are not on record. No one knows who she is. Over the course of the night, coroner Tommy Tilden (Brian Cox) and his son, Austin (Emile Hirsch), examine the body. With each incision, the mystery of Jane Doe’s identity deepens. The inside of her body is as damaged as the outside is perfect.

As the night continues, strange things start to happen inside the morgue. It’s small things at first. Strange sounds are heard. Austin thinks that he sees something out of the corner of his eye. A storm starts to rage outside. Austin says that they should stop the autopsy but Tommy says that they have to finish what they’ve started…

And things only escalate from there.

The Autopsy of Jane Doe sneaks up on you. It starts out as a collection of small scares and subtle hints that all is not right. At first, you’re kind of like, “Yeah, it’s weird noises and shadows in the corner. It’s a horror movie. Of course, that’s going on…” And then suddenly, about halfway through the film, you realize that you’re totally tense. All of those small scares have added up, leaving you wondering when the big scares are going to start. And when those big scares do arrive, they deliver. By confining the movie to one location, director André Øvredal creates a palpable atmosphere of claustrophobia and impending doom. It helps that Brian Cox is one of those older, paternal actors who you always expect to be in control of things so seeing him in a situation where he has no control carries an unexpectedly strong emotional impact.

If you doubt the power of horror, The Autopsy of Jane Doe will make you a believer.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: A Cat In The Brain (dir by Lucio Fulci)

Posted on October 3, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Oh, A Cat In the Brain.

What a frustrating film!

Listen, as someone who loves Italian horror and who feels that Lucio Fulci made some of the best (if most misunderstood) horror films of all time, I certainly wish A Cat In The Brain was a great film. Every time I watch it, I find myself hoping that it will turn out to be better than I know it’s going to be. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t necessarily think that A Cat In the Brain was a terrible film. Especially when compared to some of the other films that Fulci directed towards the end of his career, A Cat In The Brain is competently made and it certainly proves that Fulci had a better sense of humor than many critics give him credit for. It’s not really a bad film. It’s just a disappointing one.

To understand why, you have to understand just who Lucio Fulci was and why horror fans hold him in such high regard. Fulci was an Italian director, one who was responsible for some of the most visually impressive horror films of all time. Even though Fulci did not start his career working in the horror genre, it’s those films that for which he is best remembered. Many of his films, like Zombi 2, City of the Living Dead, The House By The Cemetery, and The Beyond, are rightfully remembered as classics. By design, these movies often felt like filmed nightmares and they remain influential to this very day. Literally every zombie film that has been released over the past few decades owes a debt to Fulci and The Beyond trilogy is perhaps as close as any director has ever gotten to truly capturing the feel of H.P. Lovecraft on film.

Unfortunately, many critics refuses to look past the violent content of Fulci’s films. In some countries, his movies were banned outright. In America, Fulci’s masterpiece, The Beyond, was released in a butchered, compromised form. Following the release of his controversial and disturbing slasher film, The New York Ripper, Fulci’s career went into decline and, suffering from ill-health and often in desperate need of money, he found himself directing low-budget films that were unworthy of his considerable talents. It’s one of the sadder stories in the history of Italian horror.

A Cat In The Brain was one of Fulci’s final films and it stars none other than … Lucio Fulci! Fulci plays a horror director named Lucio Fulci. Fulci is concerned that all of his recent work in the horror genre is starting to mentally damage him. For instance, after editing a scene about cannibalism, Fulci goes to a nearby restaurant and orders a steak. However, whenever he starts to eat his steak, Fulci flashes back to the movie that he’s just directed. When he goes home, the sound of the handyman using a chainsaw causes Fulci to think about a scene that he filmed, one that involved a killer chopping up a body. When a frustrated Fulci kicks a bucket of red paint, he visualizes blood. Meeting a German reporter causes Fulci to fantasize about a Nazi orgy. Is Fulci losing it? Could it be that violent movies really do cause violent urges?

Worried about his mental health, Fulci goes to see a psychiatrist, Professor Egon Schwarz (David L. Thompson). Schwarz puts Fulci order hypnosis and tells Fulci that, over the next few weeks, he will think that he has “done terrible things.” It turns out that Professor Schwarz is an aspiring serial killer. Schwarz wants to go on a killing spree and have Lucio Fulci take responsibility for it…

To be honest, the plot description probably makes A Cat In The Brain sound like it’s a lot more subversive than it actually is. It has all the ingredients to be a great satire but, unfortunately, Fulci’s heart never seems to really be in the movie. Oddly, considering that the movie is literally about his life, Fulci directs A Cat In The Brain in a rather detached and clinical fashion. There’s none of the visual poetry that distinguished Fulci’s best work.

Even worse, probably over half of this film is made up of clips that were lifted from other Fulci films. Unfortunately, the scenes don’t come from Fulci’s good films. Don’t go into A Cat In The Brain expecting to see anything from Zombi 2 or Don’t Torture A Duckling. Instead, all of the clips come from stuff like Touch of Death and The Ghosts of Sodom, films that largely represent Lucio Fulci’s declining years.

However, there is one good thing about A Cat In the Brain (beyond the title, which I think is adorable): the film ends with Fulci happy and literally sailing into the sunset. Considering both Fulci’s lasting influence as a filmmaker and the sad details of his final years, it’s hard not to feel that A Cat In The Brain gave Fulci the final scene that this talented director deserved.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Night of the Bloody Apes (dir by Rene Cardona)

Posted on October 2, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Okay, so this is a very weird movie.

Before I tell you too much about it, I do need to provide a few caveats. In 1969, Mexican director Rene Cardona released a film called La Horripilante bestia humana. When that film was released in the United States in 1972, it was retitled Night of the Bloody Apes. The film was also badly dubbed into English. The version that I watched was Night of the Bloody Apes, the dubbed version. This editing in this version was notably ragged. I don’t know if that was the result of the American distributors cutting scenes or if the Mexican version was just as bad. American distributors were notorious for roughly editing foreign-language films but then again, director Rene Cardona was notorious for not exactly being the world’s most competent filmmaker.

I guess what I’m saying is that, for all I know, La Horripilante bestia humana could have been the greatest monster movie ever made before it was transformed into Night of the Bloody Apes. However, I kind of doubt it.

Night of the Bloody Apes opens, like so many of Rene Cardona’s films, with a wrestling match. Lucy Osorio (Norma Lazareno) is a famous wrestler who, during a match, seriously injures her opponent. This leads to Lucy having a crisis of conscience. Her boyfriend, Lt. Martinez (Armando Silvestre) tells her not to worry about it. Her opponent will be fine and everyone understands that injuries are just a part of wrestling. But Lucy isn’t so sure. Is the fame worth it if it means hurting other people?

WELL, IS IT!?

Don’t worry too much about Lucy, though. Immediately after providing Lucy with a huge subplot, the film pretty much abandons her. Once Lt. Martienz encourages her not to give up, Lucy only appears occasionally throughout film, usually while naked in her dressing room. Whatever inner conflicts she was dealing with, she apparently resolved them while no one was looking. (This is one reason why I suspect that the film was re-edited by its American distributor.)

The film moves on to another plot. Dr. Krallman (José Elías Moreno) is desperately trying to save his son’s life. His angelic and kind of annoying son, who never says an unkind word about anything, is dying of leukemia. Dr. Krallman thinks that he can save him by removing his defective heart and replacing it with the strong, healthy heart of gorilla.

Sure, why not?

Working in secret with the help of his deformed assistant, Dr. Krallman performs the operation. (Cardona splices in footage of actual open heart surgery.) His son survives but at what cost? As a result of having a gorilla’s heart, Dr. Krallman’s son transforms into a body builder wearing a caveman mask. His son is no longer a sweet, angelic, and dying. Now, he’s a monosyllabic brute who runs around the city at night, attacking and killing women. Lt. Martinez is assigned to the case but that doesn’t mean much because Lt. Matinez is kind of an idiot.

So, yes, Night of the Bloody Apes is one strange movie. Actually, it’s more of a random collection of scenes than a movie. It’s a mix of totally gratuitous nudity, over-the-top gore, random wrestling footage, actual open heart surgery footage, and scenes of the man-ape running through the city. The film never seems to be quite sure whether the monster is actually an ape or some sort of hybrid. Sometimes, he runs like an ape. Sometimes, he staggers like Lon Chaney, Jr. playing the Wolfman after having had a drink or two. It’s a very odd film.

And it’s the oddness of it all that makes the film watchable. Some things are so weird that you just have to watch them once and that’s a fairly accurate description of Night of the Bloody Apes. You probably won’t watch it a second time though. It may be weird enough to sit through once but it’s never as compulsively rewatchable as an Ed Wood film or something like The Horror of Party Beach. Once is enough.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Far From Home (dir by Meiert Avis)

Posted on October 1, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

There are several lessons that can be learned from watching horror films. One that is often overlooked is the importance of staying out of trailer parks. Seriously, I have lost track of how many horror films have taken place within the confines of a trailer park. Once you see someone surrounded by RVs and mobile homes, you know that they’re probably doomed.

Take 1989’s Far From Home, for instance.

Far From Home is set in perhaps the sleaziest trailer park in America. This place sits in the middle of the Nevada desert and is run by chain-smoking Agnes Reed (Susan Tyrrell), who has a voice like a bullfrog, a daughter (Stephanie Walski) who is obsessed with watching TV and eating fishsticks, and a delinquent teenage son named Jimmy (Andras Jones).

The only law is provided by Sheriff Bill Childers (Dick Miller), who has a squad car but apparently no deputies. Childers is gruff but not that bad of a guy once you get to know him. However, he’s also played by Dick Miller and we all know better than to depend on Dick Miller to maintain the peace.

There’s a gas station nearby. A mellow Vietnam vet named Duckett (Richard Masur) owns it. Duckett is always willing to be helpful but he rarely has any gas. This is one of those small towns where the gas truck apparently only rolls in every two months or so. Still, Duckett’s a nice guy and he’s full of stories about how the government used to do atomic bomb tests in the surrounding desert.

(The scenes where Duckett drives around the desert feel somewhat out of place but they’re still enjoyable, due to Masur’s eccentric performance.)

Living in the trailer park, there’s a lot of odd people. Some of them are permanent residents while some of them are just temporarily stranded. 14 year-old Pinky (Anthony Rapp, who would go on to appear in Dazed and Confused and Rent) lives with his mother and is a permanent resident. His mother is rarely seen, though occasionally she can be glimpsed through a window, propped up in front of the TV. Pinky says that, when he was a kid, he and Jimmy were best friends. But now, Jimmy and Pinky are enemies.

And then there’s Amy (Jennifer Tilly) and Louise (Karen Austin), who are just waiting for enough gas to come in to be able to get Amy’s car to start running again. Louise is intelligent and responsible. Amy is flighty and undependable. As soon as one of them accidentally pulls the handle off the driver’s side door, you just know one of them is going to end up getting trapped in that car at a bad moment.

When Far From Home opens, two newcomers have moved into the trailer park. Writer, divorced father, and self-described “former angry young man” Charlie Cox (Matt Frewer) has just spent a month with his 13 year-old daughter, Joleen (Drew Barrymore, who was 14 when she made Far From Home). It hasn’t exactly been a great vacation and it doesn’t get any better when Charlie’s car runs out of gas. Joleen is about to turn fourteen and she doesn’t want to spend her birthday in a crummy trailer park with her incredibly dorky dad.

However, both Jimmy and Pinky are happy that Joleen will be spending at least a day or two at the trailer park. At first, Joleen crushes on Jimmy and then, after Jimmy reveals himself to be aggressive and unstable, she crushes on Pinky, who protects her from Jimmy. One of the two boys is so obsessed with Joleen that he is willing to commit murder to keep her from leaving the trailer park. But which one?

(It’s actually pretty obvious but you probably already guessed that.)

Far From Home is a film about which I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, the movie’s totally predictable. Characters do dumb things for no real reason beyond needing to move the plot forward. Charlie’s parenting abilities change drastically from scene to scene. A traumatized character goes from catatonic to recovered to catatonic again with no real explanation.

One of my main issues with the film is that there’s no real surprise about who the killer turns out to be. Even worse, once the killer’s identity is revealed, the killer suddenly turns into one of those psychos who can come up with a dozen one-liners while trying to kill someone. I mean, seriously, who does that? Are movie psychos required to take a year’s worth of improv clubs and do an apprenticeship with the Upright Citizens Brigade before they’re allowed to pick up a knife? If I was the type to commit murder (and I’m not but let’s just say that I was), I would be too busy trying to make sure everyone was dead to be witty. I’d save the jokes until I was safely on a beach somewhere, drinking pink lemonade and keeping an eye out for Ben Gardner’s boat. That’s just me, I guess.

And yet, there’s a part of me that really likes this stupid, stupid movie. It’s a surprisingly well-directed film, full of artfully composed shots. The trailer park really does take on a life of its own and the film also makes good use of a nearby abandoned apartment building. It’s a great location and, occasionally, it lends the film a dash of surrealism. (Of course, I guess you could legitimately ask who would build an apartment complex in the middle of the desert, especially one that’s still humming with radiation from the Atomic bomb tests, but let’s not.) Richard Masur, Dick Miller, and Susan Tyrrell all give good performances. For that matter, the same is true of Anthony Rapp and Andras Jones. Neither Rapp nor Jones are to blame for the fact that they were let down by a weak script.

Though I doubt either one of them would describe Far From Home as being their proudest cinematic achievement, Matt Frewer and Drew Barrymore are totally believable as father and daughter. In the end, that’s why I like this movie. Whenever I’ve watched Far From Home, I’ve always been able to relate to Joleen. When I was thirteen, I basically was Joleen.

Fortunately, though, I was never found myself stranded in a trailer park full of homicidal maniacs.

I guess I just got lucky that way.

6 Trailers For The First Of October!

Posted on October 1, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

As a part of this October’s horrorthon, I am pleased to announce the return of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation film trailers! This used to be a regular (and fairly popular) feature here on the Shattered Lens. Unfortunately, a few years ago, I discovered that I had shared almost every worthwhile trailer on YouTube and, as such, it became more of a “special occasion” type of feature.

However, enough time has passed that there are now new trailers on YouTube! Yay!

So, let’s get things started with 6 Trailers for The First of October!

(Why six? Because Lisa doesn’t do odd numbers!)

I Drink Your Blood (1971)

Let’s start things off with I Drink Your Blood (1971), a film about what happens when hippies get rabies. None other than Ryan C, the Trashfilm Guru himself, has described I Drink Your Blood as being one of the greatest grindhouse films of all time.

2. Psychomania (1973)

What’s the best way to deal with blood-crazed hippies? How about an English motorcycle gang? This was also the final film of George Sanders.

3. Werewolves on Wheels (1971)

Speaking of motorcycle gangs, you can check out Gary’s review of Werewolves on Wheels by clicking here!

4. The Beast Must Die (1974)

Not all werewolves ride motorcycles! Some of them terrorize remote locations and are hunted by Peter Cushing, as seen in The Beast Must Die.

5. Shock Waves (1977)

Peter Cushing went from filming The Beast Must Die to appearing in Shock Waves, perhaps the greatest Nazi zombie film ever made. Check out my review here!

6. The Loch Ness Horror (1982)

However, zombie nazis aren’t the only thing that live in the water! Just ask the people of Scotland!

What do you think, random hippie with cat?

Cleaning Out the DVR #14: SEX & VIOLENCE, 70’S STYLE!

Posted on September 23, 2017 by gary loggins

Lisa’s not the only person who needs to clean out their DVR around here!!

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Groundbreaking 60’s films like BONNIE & CLYDE, THE GRADUATE, THE WILD BUNCH, and MIDNIGHT COWBOY led to the complete obliteration of the Production Code, and by the sizzling 70’s it was anything goes! Low budget exploitation filmmakers benefitted most by this loosening of standards as the following quintet of movies illustrates, filled with bouncing boobs, bloody action, pot smoking, beer drinking, and hell raising:

THE MUTHERS (Dimension 1976; D; Cirio H. Santiago) – A Filipino-made “Women in Prison” Blaxploitation actioner? Yes, please! Former Playboy Playmates Jeanne Bell and Rosanne Katon, future NFL TODAY commentator Jayne Kennedy, and ex-Bond girl Trina Parks are all trapped on a coffee plantation run by the sadistic Monteiro with no chance of escape… until there is! Loaded with gore, torture, kung-fu fighting, bare breasts, a funky score, pirates (that’s right, pirates!), and a slam-bang run through the jungle – what more could you ask for?…

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Familiar Faces #5: She’s Like A Rainbeaux!

Posted on September 1, 2017 by gary loggins

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I’ve got a confession to make: I’ve had an insane crush on 70’s exploitation queen Cheryl “Rainbeaux” Smith ever since I first saw her brighten the screen in Jack Hill’s 1974 THE SWINGING CHEERLEADERS. Never a big star by any stretch of the imagination, the delightful, delectable blonde graced us with her presence throughout the 70’s and 80’s, making even the tiniest of parts memorable. This girl was just soooo damn cute!

Cheryl Lynn Smith was born on June 6, 1955. A typical California girl with blonde hair and freckles, Cheryl used to hang out on the Sunset Strip, a fixture at all the rock clubs: The Whiskey A-Go-Go, The Roxy, The Rainbow. She allegedly got the nickname “Rainbeaux” from the owner of these venues, the legendary rock impresario Mario Maglieri. Cheryl was well-known in the LA rock scene, and later in life played drums in an incarnation of The Runaways featuring…

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Kicking Off A Trend: FIVE FINGERS OF DEATH (Warner Brothers 1972)

Posted on June 10, 2017 by gary loggins

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When FIVE FINGERS OF DEATH first hit the local multiplex back in the day, everybody in the neighborhood was kung-fu fighting, throwing chops and roundhouse kicks at each other, trying to be like star Lo Lieh. Bruce Lee’s movies hadn’t yet made it our way, but David Carradine’s KUNG FU was must-see TV for every adolescent boy (and some of the cooler girls). Pretty soon chop-sockey action spread all over the city’s theaters, but it was FIVE FINGERS OF DEATH that reached New Bedford, MA first, and has always held a special place in my heart.

Hong Kong action star Lo Lieh plays Chao Chih-Hao, who’s sent to Shen Chin-Pei’s school by his mentor to train further and defeat Ming Dun-Shun’s “gangsters” in a martial arts tournament. Chih-Hao rescues damsel in distress Yen Chu Hung from some bad guys along the way, and though she comes on to him, his heart belongs to his mentor’s…

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The Legend of BILLY JACK Continues! (National Student film Co 1971, re-released by Warner Brothers 1973)

Posted on May 20, 2017 by gary loggins

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When last we saw Billy Jack, he was dismantling a brood of outlaw bikers in BORN LOSERS . This time around, he’s taking on a whole town’s worth of rednecks as Tom Laughlin’s half-breed ex-Green Beret returns in BILLY JACK, the wildly popular film that combines action with social commentary, and helped kick off the martial arts craze of the 70’s.

BILLY JACK almost never saw the light of day, as Laughlin’s financing was shut off by American-International Pictures. 20th Century-Fox then picked it up, but didn’t think it deserved to be released, so Laughlin went the indie route, under the banner of National Student Film Co. in 1971. Poor distribution and poor reviews caused the film to tank, but the good folks at Warner Brothers saw something in it, and gave it a national release two years later. Young audiences of the day flocked to it in droves, cheering as Billy Jack…

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