Tag Archives: Lucio Fulci

Scenes I Love: Inferno

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Inferno is Dario Argento’s 1980 sequel to Suspiria.  Inferno seems to bring out the extreme reactions in Argentonians — it’s either loved or hated.  I happen to love it.

Below is one of the film’s best known sequences, the one where Irene Miracle ends up taking a surreal swim through a basement.  To me, this sequence is almost Fulciesque in it’s dream-like approach (punctuated, of course, by one sudden grotesque shock at the end).  Lucio Fulci’s The Beyond, which is often compared to Inferno, featured a similarly flooded basement. 

Words of warning: This scene lasts 6 and a half minutes.  Also, the first few minutes are nearly ruined by Keith Emerson’s bombastic score.  Fortunately, once Miracle takes her fateful dive, Mr. Emerson is silenced.

Too Sordid To Ever Be Corrupted

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“How could you have possibly enjoyed that movie?”

I hate that question.  I hate the self-righteous tone of it.  I hate the demand that I justify anything that I choose to do with my life.  I hate the implication of the question, the suggestion that somehow there is some sort of moral force at the center of the universe that determines whether or not a movie can be enjoyed.

Unfortunately, no matter how obviously justified I am in loathing that question, it’s still one that I am frequently asked.  How can I not only enjoy watching old school exploitation and grindhouse films (the majority of which were made before I was even born) but also devote a good deal of my time to not only watching these movies but tracking them down and then telling the rest of the world how much I love them?

(Of course, what they’re really asking is what are you doing watching exploitive trash like House On The Edge of the Park or Fight For Your Life when you should be out finding a husband, driving an SUV, and living a life of quiet desperation?)

First off, I should confess.  I have commitment issues, I know it.  I realize that, as a result of some personal experiences in the past, that I tend to beg for affection and attention even while I’m putting up my own invisible wall to keep anyone from getting too close.  It’s not easy for me to trust but, after writing for this site since May, I feel like maybe it’s time to share a little bit more about me.  Hi.  My name is Lisa Marie.  I’m 24.  I have three older sisters that I love.  I’m a proud to be an Irish-German-Spanish-Italian-American.  I lived in five different states before I was 13 and I’m rarely amused when people point out the country twang in my voice.  Up until I was 17, ballet was my life but then I fell down a flight of stairs, broke my ankle in two places, and that was the end of that.  I worked very hard to earn a degree in Art History.  Not surprisingly, my current job has nothing to do with art or history.  I have asthma and heterochromia (my right eye is a darker shade of green than the left).  I’m blind without my contacts.  I like cats, driving fast, and being single.  I dislike dogs, needy men, and those tiny little smart cars.  The only thing that can equal my love for the Grindhouse is my hatred for the Mainstream.

Here’s a few reasons why.

1) Before Independent Film, there was the Grindhouse.

Today, if a young director wants to show what he’s capable of doing, he makes his own little film and enters it into various film festivals and, if he’s made something interesting, he might sign a distribution deal and his film might pop up down here in Dallas at the Angelika theater.  In the 70s, that young director would make an exploitation film, hope that it had enough sleaze appeal to make back its budget by playing in a New York Grindhouse (or a Southern drive-in) and, if he had made something interesting, his cheap, exploitation film might eventually end up being released on DVD by Anchor Bay or Blue Underground.  The best Grindhouse films were made by director who were eager to show what they were capable of doing.  These movies were not made by multimillionaires with houses on both coasts of the country.  Grindhouse movies were made by director who had to work to create something memorable, filmmakers who knew that they might never get another chance to put their vision on-screen.

2) The Mainstream Lies.  The Grindhouse is honest.

Mainstream films are just that.  They are films designed to appeal to the widest possible audience.  A mainstream movie is not made for you.  A Mainstream movie is made to appeal to the brain-dead suburbanites who can be easily recruited at the local mall to be a part of a test screening.  A Mainstream movie is made to be inoffensive.  A Mainstream movie is edited and re-edited to remove anything that could possibly negatively reflect on the bottom line.

Grindhouse movies, however, didn’t have time for that.  Grindhouse movies were made to exploit the moment.  As a result, there was no time to worry about appealing to everyone.  There was no time to constantly edit until not a single rough edge remained.  Grindhouse films are messy.  Grindhouse films are not always pleasant.  They don’t always have the perfect ending.  In short, Grindhouse movies are like life itself.

In the end, safe and inoffensive mainstream movies are made to appeal to the who we wish we were.  Grindhouse movies — sordid, sometimes uncomfortable, and always appealing to the audience’s most primal thoughts, fears , and desires — are made to appeal to who we actually are.

3) The Mainstream is bland.  The Grindhouse is dangerous and unpredictable.

Where else but in a Grindhouse film could you hear a killer who speaks like a duck like in Lucio Fulci’s The New York Ripper?  Because the Grindhouse was free of the need to try to fit in with what the mainstream decreed to be normal, the Grindhouse had the freedom to come up with some of the most brilliantly demented plots in the history of film.  When was the last time that the plot of a Mainstream film really caught you off guard?  I’m not talking about safe, inoffensive surprises like Avatar‘s 3-D effects.  I’m talking about a plot where, halfway through, you look at your fellow viewer and you both say, “What the fuck was that!?”  Anything can happen in the Grindhouse.  As soon as things start to feel safe and a little boring, the Grindhouse has the ability to make things exciting again.  The Mainstream, meanwhile, just asks you to get married.

4) The Mainstream always condescends.  The Grindhouse occasionally empowers.

Here’s a story of two movies.  In the mainstream Brave One, Jodie Foster gets a gun after she’s raped and her dog is stolen.  (In typical mainstream fashion, the movie doesn’t seem to be sure which crime is supposed to be worse.)  In the grindhouse Ms. 45, Zoe Tamerlis gets a gun after she’s raped twice in one day.  In the Brave One, Foster passively sits on the New York subway and waits until she threatened with rape a second time before she kills the potential rapist.  In Ms. 45, Tamerlis shoots every man she sees because she knows that every man she sees is a potential rapist.  In The Brave One, Foster gets her revenge by remaining the victim.  In Ms. 45, Tamerlis becomes the aggressor.  Both Foster and Tamerlis act in self-defense but Foster is wracked with guilt because the mainstream cannot risk losing its audience.  Tamerlis becomes stronger and more confident with each murder as, for the first time, she has found a way to control her own destiny.  At the end of The Brave One, Foster is not only rescued by a man but she gets her dog back too.  At the end of Ms. 45, Tamerlis goes on a shooting rampage at a Halloween party and is finally killed by another woman.  The Brave One‘s tag line was “How many wrongs to make it right?”  Ms. 45’s tagline: “She was used and abused and it will never happen again!”

I know this is probably going to be my most controversial argument.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating that we should just go out and start randomly shooting men.  But, I will say this — in Ms. 45, Zoe Tamerlis refuses to be a victim and she — and the film — refuses to let society off the hook.  When I think about Ms. 45, it doesn’t inspire me to hate men (because, trust me, I don’t) and it certainly doesn’t inspire me to grab a gun and start shooting.  It does, however, inspire me to not allow myself to fall into that never-ending cycle of victimhood.

I’m not attempting to argue that Grindhouse films are secretly feminist films.  Grindhouse films are infamous for exploiting women.  However, so does the mainstream.  (Of the two films, The Brave One features nudity.  Ms. 45 does not.)  Both the Grindhouse and the mainstream obviously get off on victimizing women.  However, in the Grindhouse, women were occasionally (though certainly not often) allowed to fight back with the same aggression and determination that the mainstream, for the most part, usually reserves just for men.

(If The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo had been released in the 70s, it would have played at the Grindhouse.)

5) Lastly, and most importantly, the Grindhouse is still our little secret.

Let’s just admit it — independent films are trendy.  Contemporary independent films have, to a large extent, become the new mainstream.  The earnest film students who had a Sundance hit are now going to Hollywood to make the next Benjamin Button.  Sundance is just ShoWest with more facial hair.  However, the old school grindhouse will never sell out because it no longer exists.  It was destroyed by the morality police before it could sacrifice its soul.  While an independent filmmaker is just a director who will eventually grow up and break your heart, the great Grindhouse films are frozen in time, too sordid to ever be corrupted.  The Mainstream will never embrace the Grindhouse and for that reason, the Grindhouse will always be the ultimate statement of freedom.

10 (Plus) Of My Favorite DVD Commentary Tracks

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

It seems like I’m always taking a chance when I listen to a DVD commentary track.  Occasionally, a commentary track will make a bad film good and a good film even better.  Far too often, however, listening to a bad or boring commentary track will so totally ruin the experience of watching one of my favorite movies that I’ll never be able to enjoy that movie in the same way again.  I’ve learned to almost always involve any commentary track that involves anyone credited as being an “executive producer.”  They always want to tell you every single detail of what they had to do to raise the money to make the film.  Seriously, executive producers suck. 

However, there are more than a few commentary tracks that I could listen to over and over again.  Listed below are a few of them.

10) Last House On The Left (The Original) — Apparently, there’s a DVD of this film that features a commentary track in which stars David Hess and Fred Lincoln nearly come to blows while debating whether or not this movie should have been made.  The DVD I own doesn’t feature that commentary but it does feature a track featuring writer/director Wes Craven and producer Sean S. Cunningham.  The thing that I love about their commentary is that they both just come across as such nice, kinda nerdy guys.  You look at the disturbing images onscreen and then you hear Cunningham saying, “We shot this scene in my mom’s backyard.  There’s her swimming pool…”  Both Craven and Cunningham are remarkably honest about the film’s shortcomings (at one point, Craven listens to some of his more awkward dialogue and then says, “Apparently, I was obsessed with breasts…”) while, at the same time, putting the film’s controversy into the proper historical context.

9) Burnt Offerings — When Burnt Offerings, which is an occasionally interesting haunted house movie from 1976, was released on DVD, it came with a commentary track featuring director Dan Curtis, star Karen Black, and the guy who wrote the movie.  This commentary track holds a strange fascination for me because it, literally, is so mind-numbingly bad that I’m not convinced that it wasn’t meant to be some sort of parody of a bad commentary track.   It’s the commentary track equivalent of a car crash.  Curtis dominates the track which is a problem because he comes across like the type of grouchy old man that Ed Asner voiced in Up before his house floated away.  The screenwriter, whose name I cannot bring myself to look up, bravely insists that there’s a lot of nuance to his painfully simple-minded script.  Karen Black, meanwhile, tries to keep things positive.  The high point of the commentary comes when Black points out that one actor playing a menacing chauffeur is giving a good performance (which he is, the performance is the best part of the movie).  She asks who the actor is.  Curtis snaps back that he doesn’t know and then gets testy when Black continues to praise the performance.  Finally, Curtis snaps that the actor’s just some guy they found at an audition.  Actually, the actor is a veteran character actor named Anthony James who has accumulated nearly 100 credits and had a prominent supporting role in two best picture winners (In the Heat of the Night and Unforgiven).

8 ) Cannibal Ferox — This is a good example of a really unwatchable movie that’s made watchable by an entertaining commentary track.  The track is actually made up of two different tracks, one with co-star Giovanni Lombardo Radice and one with director Umberto Lenzi.  Lenzi loves the film and, speaking in broken English, happily defends every frame of it and goes so far as to compare the movie to a John Ford western.  The wonderfully erudite Radice, on the other hand, hates the movie and spends his entire track alternatively apologizing for the movie and wondering why anyone would possibly want to watch it.  My favorite moment comes when Radice, watching the characters onscreen move closer and closer to their bloody doom, says, “They’re all quite stupid, aren’t they?”

7) Race With The Devil — Race with the Devil is an obscure but enjoyable drive-in movie from the 70s.  The DVD commentary is provided by costar Lara Parker who, along with providing a lot of behind-the-scenes information, also gets memorably catty when talking about some of her costars.  And, let’s be honest, that’s what most of us want to hear during a DVD commentary.

6) Anything featuring Tim Lucas — Tim Lucas is the world’s foremost authority on one of the greatest directors ever, Mario Bava.  Anchor Bay wisely recruited Lucas to provide commentary for all the Bava films they’ve released on DVD and, even when it comes to some of Bava’s lesser films, Lucas is always informative and insightful.  Perhaps even more importantly, Lucas obviously enjoys watching these movies as much as the rest of us.  Treat yourself and order the Mario Bava Collection Volume 1 and Volume 2.

5) Tropic Thunder — The commentary track here is provided by the film’s co-stars, Jack Black, Ben Stiller, and Robert Downey, Jr.  What makes it great is that Downey provides his commentary in character as Sgt. Osiris and spends almost the entire track beating up on Jack Black.  This is a rare case of a great movie that has an even greater commentary track.

4) Strange Behavior — This wonderfully offbeat slasher film from 1981 is one of the best movies that nobody seems to have heard of.  For that reason alone, you need to get the DVD and watch it.  Now.  As an added bonus, the DVD comes with a lively commentary track featuring co-stars Dan Shor and Dey Young and the film’s screenwriter, Bill Condon (who is now the director that Rob Marshall wishes he could be).  Along with providing a lot of fascinating behind-the-scenes trivia, the three of them also discuss how Young ended up getting seduced by the film’s star (Michael Murphy, who was several decades older), how shocked Condon was that nobody on the set seemed to realize that he’s gay, and why American actors have so much trouble speaking in any accent other than their own.  Most memorable is Young remembering the experience of sitting in a theater, seeing herself getting beaten up onscreen, and then listening as the people sitting around her cheered.

3) Imaginationland — As anyone who has ever listened to their South Park commentaries knows, Matt Stone and Trey Parker usually only offer up about five minutes of commentary per episode before falling silent.  Fortunately, those five minutes are usually hilarious and insightful.  Not only are Parker and Stone remarkably candid when talking about the strengths and weaknesses of their work but they also obviously enjoy hanging out with each other.  With the DVD release of South Park’s Imaginationland trilogy, Matt and Trey attempted to record a “full” 90-minute commentary track.  For the record, they manage to talk for 60 minutes before losing interest and ending the commentary.  However, that track is the funniest, most insightful 60 minutes that one could hope for.

2) Donnie Darko — The original DVD release of Donnie Darko came with 2 wonderful commentary tracks.  The first one features Richard Kelley and Jack Gyllenhaal, talking about the very metaphysical issues that the film addresses.  Having listened to the track, I’m still convinced that Kelley pretty much just made up the film as he went along but its still fascinating to the hear everything that was going on his mind while he was making the film.  However, as good as that first track is, I absolutely love and adore the second one because it features literally the entire cast of the movie.  Seriously, everyone from Drew Barrymore to Jena Malone to Holmes Osborne to the guy who played Frank the Bunny is featured on this track.  They watch the film, everyone comments on random things, and it’s difficult to keep track of who is saying what.  And that’s part of the fun.  It’s like watching the film at a party full of people who are a lot more interesting, funny, and likable than your own actual friends.

1) The Beyond — This movie, one of the greatest ever made, had one of the best casts in the history of Italian horror and the commentary here features two key members of that cast — Catriona MacColl and the late (and wonderful) David Warbeck.  The commentary, which I believe was actually recorded for a laserdisc edition of the film (though, to be honest, I’ve never actually seen a “laserdisc” and I have my doubts as to whether or not they actually ever existed), was recorded in 1997, shortly after the death of director Lucio Fulci and at a time when Warbeck himself was dying from cancer.  (Warbeck would pass away two weeks after recording this commentary).  This makes this commentary especially poignant.  Warbeck was, in many ways, the human face of Italian exploitation, a talented actor who probably deserved to be a bigger star but who was never ashamed of the films he ended up making.  This commentary — in which MacColl and Warbeck quite cheerfully recall discuss making this underrated movie — is as much a tribute to Warbeck as it is to Fulci.  Highpoint: MacColl pointing out all the scenes in which Warbeck nearly made her break out laughing.  My personal favorite is the scene (which made it into the final film) where Warbeck attempts to load a gun by shoving bullets down the barrel.  The wonderful thing about this track is that Warbeck and MacColl enjoy watching it too.

Poll: Which Movie Should Lisa Marie Review?

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, with the help of my friend Jeff, I conducted an experiment. 

First, I took out my contacts which basically left me blind.  Then, just to make sure I was totally without sight, I had Jeff blindfold me.  He then took me by the hand and led me over to my DVD collection.  Clumsily, I grabbed 10 DVDs at random and handed them back to Jeff.  I then proceeded to walk into a wall, at which point I tried to take off the blindfold and ended up losing my balance and falling down flat on my ass. 

Why was I risking life and limb to randomly select 10 DVDs?

I did it so you could have the chance to tell me what to do.  At the bottom of this article, you will find a poll listing the 10 DVDs I randomly selected.  Come next Saturday (June 19th to be exact), I will watch and review whichever movie receives the most votes in the poll.  In short, I’m giving you all the power.

Now, to be honest, I’m feeling just a little trepidation about doing this.  Whenever you set up a poll, you’re running the risk of absolutely no one voting.  Fortunately, I have a plan B in that I recently got the 1st season of Gossip Girl on DVD.  If nobody votes in the poll, I’ll just spend next Saturday watching Gossip Girl and writing several long — very long —  essays on how different Chuck is in the books as compared to the TV show.

The choice, as they say, is yours.

The 10 movies I blindly selected are listed below in alphabetical order.

1) Anatomy of a Murder (1959) — Jimmy Stewart asks Lee Remick a lot of questions about her panties.

2) Darling (1965) — Julie Christie claws her way to the top of the modeling industry and discovers ennui.

3) Emanuelle in America (1978) — Emanuelle investigates decadence in America.  Some people think that this movie contains footage taken from an actual snuff film.  We call those people “idiots.”

4) Hatchet For The Honeymoon (1969) — Mario Bava directs this film about a man driven to murder by the sight of an unflattering bridal gown.

5) Lost in Translation (2003) — I will admit that I squealed with joy when I discovered that I had randomly selected one of my favorite movies of all time.

6) Primer (2004) — Engineers play with time and space.  Oddly enough, this movie was filmed a few miles away from where I live.

7) The Sidewalks of Bangkok (1986) — Like most of Jean Rollin’s film, this is something of a misunderstood masterpiece.

8 ) Sole Survivor (1982) — An atmospheric little horror film with a sadly generic title.

9) Starcrash (1978) — Strange sci-fi movie in which Christopher Plummer recruits space pirate Caroline Munro to battle a pre-Maniac Joe Spinell.  This film also marks the screen debut of David Hasselhoff.

10) The Sweet House of Horrors (1989) — One of Lucio Fulci’s last films.

So, those are our ten options.  On Saturday, July 19th, I will sit down, watch, and review whichever movie receives the most votes.  On that day, for four to six hours, I will give up my independence and submit to the wishes of the majority.

Film Review: Zombie 5: Killing Birds (dir. by Claudio Lattanzi and Joe D’Amato)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Thanks to the wonderful people at Anchor Bay, I recently watched Zombie 5: Killing Birds, one of the last of the old school Italian horror films.

Admittedly, when I first hit play on the DVD player, I was expecting the worst.  Of all the various official and unofficial sequels to Lucio Fulci’s masterpiece Zombi 2 (which, of course, was itself an unofficial prequel to Dawn of the Dead), Zombie 5: Killing Birds has the worst reputation.  While most Italian horror fans seem to agree that Zombie 4 is enjoyable on its own stupid terms and even Zombi 3 has a few brave defenders, its hard to find anyone willing to defend Killing Birds.  The general consensus has always seemed to be that Killing Birds is a generic and rather forgettable splatter film that, title aside, had absolutely nothing in common with the Fulci classic.

Having now seen Killing Birds, I can say that the general consensus, in this case, is largely correct.  Killing Birds is generic, predictable, and ultimately forgettable.  However, taken on its own terms, it’s a perfectly enjoyable way for a lover of zombie cinema to waste 90 minutes.  As long as you don’t compare it to Zombi 2, i’ts a perfectly tolerable piece of trash that actually has one or two memorable moments tossed randomly through its running time.  At the very least, its a hundred times better than Umberto Lenzi’s similar Black Demons.

The film deals with a bunch of grad students who, while searching for a nearly extinct species of Woodpecker, end up spending the night at a deserted house in Louisiana.  Many years ago, a brutal murder was committed at this house and, well, you can guess the rest.  The grad students end up falling prey to a bunch of zombies, largely because the students are all remarkably stupid.  Meanwhile, B-movie veteran Robert Vaughn shows up as Dr. Fred Brown, a blind man who spends his days studying birds.  There’s a lot of birds in this movie and its never quite clear how they link up to the living dead but they certainly do look menacing flying past the camera.

With the exception of Vaughn (who overacts just enough to keep things interesting without going so far over the top as to become ludicrous), the film’s cast is likeable but not memorable.  Everyone’s playing a stereotype (i.e., the leader, the computer geek, the slut, the girl with looks and brains) and no one makes much of an effort to be anything more than a stereotype.  While this certainly keeps Killing Birds from displaying anything resembling nuance, it’s also strangely comforting.  Its lets a neurotic viewer like me know, from the start, that there’s no need to think too much about anything she might see for the next hour and a half.  Since this movie was made in the late 80s, most of the men sport a mullet and all of the women wear those terribly unflattering khaki pants that I guess were all the rage back then.

As I stated before, the film does have its occasional strengths.  Some of the deaths are memorably nasty (even if the gore effects are decidedly cut-rate, pun not intended).  As well, the film does an excellent job at capturing the hot, humid atmosphere of the Louisiana bayous.  I’ve spent enough time in that part of the country that I can attest that the movie perfectly captures the stagnant heat and the way dehydration can cause your mind to play tricks on you.  While the zombies themselves are hardly as impressive as Fulci’s, the filmmakers wisely keep them in the shadows for most of the film and, if nothing else, this allows the viewer to imagine something scarier than what they’re actually seeing.  Finally, this movie does have one of the most effective nightmare sequences that I’ve ever seen.  Lasting barely a minute and not really having much to do with the overall plot, this nightmare still features some rather disturbing imagery.  One image, in particular, has so stuck with me that I found myself paying homage to it in a my own writing.

Though the movie’s director is credited as being Claudio Lattanzi, it is pretty much an open secret that the movie was actually directed by the infamous Joe D’Amato (who, regardless of what else he may have done during his storied life, also directed one of my favorite movies ever, Beyond The Darkness).  I’ve read a few interviews where D’Amato said that he allowed Lattanzi to be credited as director because he wanted to help Lattanzi’s launch his own career.  To judge by the movie itself, however, it seems more probable that Lattanzi wasn’t delivering the movie that D’Amato wanted and D’Amato stepped in as a result.  Regardless, Killing Birds is hardly the best example of D’Amato’s work but, at the same time, it’s hardly the worst either. 

In the end, Killing Birds is a movie that will probably be best appreciated by those who already have a good working knowledge of Italian exploitation films.  It’s hardly a masterpiece (and, despite enjoying it, I would hesitate to even call it a “good” movie) but it’s not really deserving of all the criticism that it’s received over the years either.  As a bonus, the Anchor Bay DVD come with a lengthy interview with Robert Vaughn in which he discussed his career in B-movies and, while Vaughn says nothing about Killing Birds during the interview, he’s still interesting and enjoyable to listen to.  Unlike a lot of “reputable” actors who have made B-movies, Vaughn never condescends to the films that both started and ended his movie career.

5 Performers Who Deserve A Role In A Tarantino Movie

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

One of the great things about watching a Quentin Tarantino film is the chance to see B-movie actors and various grindhouse veterans getting a chance to show off just how talented they actually are.  Below are four men and one woman who, in a perfect world, would have a date with Tarantino in the near future.

1) Giovanni Lombardo Radice

Who is he? He’s one of the great Italian exploitation actors.  He played a character named Charles Bukowski in Cannibal Apocalypse.  He was Bob the Pervert in City of th Living Dead.  Remember his little disco dance in House On The Edge of the Park?  And who can forget him snorting cocaine, getting castrated, and shouting “Twatface!” in Cannibal Ferox?  He was also a regular in the movies of Michele Soavi and though he hasn’t been as active in recent years, he can be seen in both Gangs of New York and the Omen remake.

Why Should Tarantino Use Him?  Are you kidding?  Because he rocks that’s why.  Plus, Tarantino has said that he’s a fan and, in a documentary included on the Cannibal Apocalypse DVD, Radice expressed a desire to some day work with Tarantino.  And, with his current bald look, Radice could easily play Mussolini if Tarantino wanted to make a prequel to Inglorious Basterds.

2) Tony Sirico

Who is He? He’s the Italian version of Danny Trejo, a real-life gangster who went to prison and then became an actor. 

Why Should Tarantino Use Him? Because Paulie was my favorite character on The Sopranos.  Sirico deserves at least one starring role in his  post-prison career.

3) Colby Donaldson

Who Is He? Okay, Colby’s kinda been a little bit pathetic on the current season of Survivor but in his two previous appearances on the show, Colby was the man.  In between reality show appearances, Colby has pursued a career as an actor and, surprisingly, he’s not half bad.  His best post-Survivor role, though, was playing himself on Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Why Should Tarantino Use Him? Because someday, Tarantino’s going to have to make an actual western and who would be better to star in it than my fellow Texan, Colby?

4) Fred J. Lincoln

Who is He? Lincoln has spent most of his career working in the porn industry but Lincoln has appeared in a few “mainstream” movies.  Most infamously, he played “Weasel” in the original Last House On The Left.  In the 70s, Lincoln was the owner of Plato’s Retreat, an infamous sex club in NYC.  He’s also one of the central figures in Legs McNeil’s The Other Hollywood: The Uncensored Oral History of the Porn Film Industry .

Why  Should Tarantino Use Him?  David Hess got the majority of the attention but, of Last House’s trio of killers, Lincoln was the truly scary one.  A cameo in a Tarantino movie would be the perfect way to pay credit to Lincoln’s role in one of the seminal exploitation films in history.

5) Catriona MacColl

Who is She? English actress who appeared in several exploitation films in the late 70s and early 80s.  She is probably best known for starring in Fulci’s Beyond trilogy.  Currently semi-retired from acting and living in France.

Why Should Tarantino Use Her? Because she starred in The Beyond, of course!

10 Films I Must See Before I Die

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

I love movies.  I love watching movies, reading about movies, and talking about movies.  Perhaps most of all, I love the hunt.  I love discovering movies or finding movies that had previously, for me, only existed in reviews or as a collection of screen captures.  To me, there is no greater experience the watching a movie for the first time.  (Even if, as often happens, that first time turns out to be the only time.)  Listed below are ten movies that I have yet to see but desperately hope to at some point in my life. 

1)  Giallo a Venzia (1979) — This is supposedly one of the most graphically depraved Italian horror films ever made.  If that’s not a recommendation, I don’t know what is.  Actually, I haven’t heard a single good thing about this movie but it has still become something of a Holy Grail in my quest to see as much Italian horror as possible.  This is largely because the movie is nearly impossible to find.  When it was first released, it was banned in the UK as part of the so-called “video nasties” scare.  (Trust the English to not only ban a movie but to come up with an annoying name for doing so in the process.)   This led to it never really getting much of a release in the English-speaking world and, now years later, it’s only available on bootleg DVDs.  As such, I imagine that if I ever do see it, it’ll be because I made a deal in a back alley with some bald guy who speaks with a Russian accent.  Much as with drug prohibition, the fact that its “forbidden” has made this movie rather attractive.

The few people who have seen this always mention that towards the end of the movie, Mariangela Giordano’s legs are graphically sawed off.  This makes sense as Giordano was always meeting grotesque ends in Italian horror movies.  In Patrick Lives Again, she is impaled (through her vagina no less) by a fireplace poker while in Burial Ground, she makes the mistake of breast feeding her zombie son.  In many ways, Giordano was like a female Giovanni Lombardo Radice.  However, its odd to consider that while the sight of Giordano’s legs getting sawed off was enough to get the film banned, the sight of poker being graphically driven into her crotch was apparently totally acceptable.  Censorship is a strange thing, no?

One last reason I want to see this movie — its filmed in Venice.  When I was in Italy, I fell in love with Venice.  (I also fell in love with a tour guide named Luigi but that’s another story.)

2) An uncut version of Nightmares in a Damaged Brain (1981) — This is another banned Italian movie.  When Nightmares was originally released, Tom Savini was credited as being behind the special effects.  Savini, however, has long claimed to have had little to nothing to do with the movie.  As Savini, to his credit, has never been embarrassed to claim ownership for his effects (regardless of the movie they appear in), I’m inclined to believe him.

In many ways, Nightmares reminds me of a film that Savini actually did work on, Maniac.  Not so much as far as the plot is concerned but just in the same bleak worldview and almost palpable sleaze that seems to ooze from every scene.  The version that is most widely available on DVD (and the one that I own) appears to be the cut version that was eventually okayed for release in the UK and even cut, this is a film that remains oddly compelling in just how much its willing to immerse itself in sleaze.  The uncut version remains elusive but someday, I will find it.

3) The Day The Clown Cried (1972) — You knew this one was coming, didn’t you?  I think everyone wants to see Jerry Lewis’s never released Holocaust comedy.  Supposedly, Lewis keeps the movie in a locked vault which I just find to be oddly hilarious.  My hope is that, if nothing else, some enterprising filmmaker will make a movie about a crack team of thieves who break into Jerry Lewis’s estate just to steal the only copy of The Day The Clown Cried and sell it to the people at Anchor Bay.  Jerry could play himself.  I also think this film will see the light of day sooner or later.  At some point, either Jerry Lewis or his estate is going to need the money.

4) The Other Side of the Wind — Orson Welles apparently spent the last few decades of his life making this movie.  At the time of his death, the movie was reportedly 95% film but only 40% edited.  Apparently, because of a whole lot of complicated legal things, the movie has spent the last 30 years under lock and key in Iran.  Even if somebody could rescue it, the remaining footage still needs a strong hand to put it together.  While I’m sure that many directors would be happy to volunteer to provide that hand, the two names most frequently mentioned — Peter Bogdonavich and Henry Jaglom — do not fill me with confidence.  I’d rather see the final film put together by Jess Franco, who was assistant director on Chimes at Midnight.

5) The Fantastic Four (1994) — This is not the dull movie that came out in 2005.  This apparently an even duller version of the same film that was made 11 years earlier for legal reasons.  Apparently, Roger Corman would have lost the movie rights to the comic book if he didn’t start production on a film by a certain date.  So, this film was made on the cheap and then promptly shelved.  My main desire to see it comes from the same morbid desire that makes me look at crime scene photos.  How bad can it be?

6) Le Cinque Giornate (1973) — This Italian film is apparently many things.  It’s a comedy.  It’s a historical epic.  It’s a satire of then contemporary Italian politics.  And most of all, it’s also apparently the only non-horror film directed by Dario Argento.  This was Argento’s fourth  film, coming after his celebrated animal trilogy and it was apparently an attempt, on Argento’s part, to break away from the giallo genre that he has since come to symbolize.  Though the film apparently did well enough in Italy, it failed to establish Argento as a director of comedy and that’s probably for the best as Argento’s fifth film would be the classic Deep Red.  Still, it’s hard not to play the “What If?” game, especially when it involves an iconic a figure as Dario Argento.  It’s also interesting to compare Argento’s attempts to go from horror to comedy with the career of Lucio Fulci, who went from comedy to horror.

7) Cocksucker Blues (1972) — Robert Frank’s documentary of the Rolling Stone touring America was officially unreleased because of its title.  While that title certainly played a role, it also appears that the film was unreleased because of just how much hedonism Frank managed to capture backstage.  The Stones apparently went to the court to block the film’s release.  Somehow, this resulted in a ruling that the movie can only be shown if Robert Frank is physically present.  Mr. Frank, if you’re alive and reading this, you have an open invitation to come down to Texas and stay with me anytime you want.  Seriously.

8 ) The Profit (2001) — The Profit is a satiric film about a cult.  The film’s cult is known as The Church of Scientific Spiritualism and is led by a recluse named L. Conrad Powers.  Sound familiar?  The film’s release was (and continues to be) prevented by a lawsuit brought by the Church of Scientology.  Say what you will about the Vatican, at least you can attack them in a movie without having to worry about getting sued or blown up.

9) Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1987) — Probably one of the most famous film that most of us will never see, Superstar tells the story of Karen Carpenter through the use of Barbie dolls.  Director Todd Haynes supposedly failed to get the rights to the music he used in the film and, obviously enough, nobody in the Carpenter camp was all the eager to give him permission. 

9) Can Hieronymous Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe And Find True Happiness (1969) — God, don’t you hate that title?  And, honestly, are you surprised that a film with that title is apparently history’s 1st X-rated musical?  Anyway, this is a movie I’ve come across in various film reference books where it’s either described as a masterpiece or (more often) one of the worst movies ever made.  Myself, I love musicals and if the musical numbers are mixed in with explicit sex — well, why not?  But that title — that title just gives me a bad feeling.  Another thing that gives me a bad feeling is that the movie was apparently the brainchild of Anthony Newley.  I don’t know much about Mr. Newley but what I do know seems to indicate that he personified everything that most people hate about musicals.  The film is apparently autobiographical and its about a really talented composer who treats the women in his life terribly but has a lot of reasons (or excuses) that we learn about in elaborate flashbacks and — wait, I’ve seen this movie.  Oh wait, that was Nine.  Anyway, Merkin was a huge flop and it has never been released on any type of video format.  Yet, it has not been forgotten which can only mean that it must have really traumatized the critics who saw it.  In other words, this is another one of my “how-bad-can-it-be” crime scene movies.

10) The uncut, original, 9-hour version of Erich Von Stroheim’s Greed (1924) — A girl can dream, can’t she?

My Top Ten Books About The Movies

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

I love movies and I love books so I guess it would stand to reason that I love books about movies the most of all.  (I also love movies about books but there are far fewer of those, unfortunately.)  Below are my personal favorites.  I’m not necessarily saying that these are the ten greatest film books ever written.  I’m just saying that they’re the ones that I’m always happy to know are waiting for me at home.

10) Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture by Theodore Gershuny — This is one of the great finds of mine my life.  I found this in a used bookstore and I bought it mostly because it only cost a dollar. Only later did I discover that I had found one of the greatest nonfiction books about the shooting of a movie ever written!  Gershuny was present during the filming of a movie called Rosebud in the early 70s.   I’ve never seen Rosebud but, as Gershuny admits, it was a critical disaster that managed to lose a ton of money.  The book provides a fascinating wealth of backstage gossip as well as memorable portraits of director Otto Preminger and actors Robert Mitchum (who was originally cast in the lead role), Peter O’Toole (who took over after Mitchum walked off the set), and Isabelle Huppert.   If nothing else, this book should be read for the scene where O’Toole beats up critic Kenneth Tynan.

9) Suspects by David Thomson — A study of American cinema noir   disguised as a novel, Suspects imagines what would happen if George Bailey from It’s a Wonderful Life fell in love with Laura from the movie of the same name.  Well, apparently it would lead to Sunset Boulevard’s Norma Desmond having an affair with Chinatown’s Noah Cross and to one of George’s sons, sensitive little Travis, getting a job in New York City as a Taxi Driver.  And that’s just a small sampling of what happens in this glorious mindfuck of a novel.

8 ) Profondo Argento by Alan Jones — Long-time fan Alan Jones examines each of Dario Argento’s films (even Argento’s obscure historical comedy The Five Days of Milan) and proceeds to celebrate and (in many cases) defend Argento’s career.  Jones also interviews and profiles several of Argento’s most frequent collaborators — Daria Nicolodi, Asia and Fiore Argento, Simon Boswell, Claudio Simonetti, Keith Emerson, George Romero, Lamberto Bava, Michele Soavi, and many others.  Jones’ sympathetic yet humorous profile of Luigi Cozzi is priceless.

7)  Spaghetti Nightmares by Luca Palmerini — Spaghetti Nightmares is a collection of interviews conducted with such Italian filmmakers as Dario Argento, Ruggero Deodato, Umberto Lenzi, Lucio Fulci, and others.  Among the non-Italians interviewed are Tom Savini (who, as always, comes across as appealingly  unhinged) and David Warbeck.  (Sadly, both Warbeck and Fulci would die shortly after being interviewed.)  What makes this interesting is that, for once, Argento, Fulci, et al. are actually being interviewed by a fellow countryman as opposed to an American accompanied by a translator.  As such, the subsequent interviews turn out to be some of the most revealing on record.

6) Sleazoid Express by Bill Landis and Michelle Clifford — Landis and Clifford’s book is both a history and a defense of the old grindhouse theaters of New York City.  Along with describing, in loving and memorable detail, some of New York’s most infamous grindhouses, they also write about some of the more popular movies to play at each theater.  Along the way, they also offer up revealing profiles of such legendary figures as David Hess and Mike and Roberta Findley.  Reading this book truly made me mourn the fact that if I ever did find myself in New York City, I won’t be able to hit the old grindhouse circuit.

5) Beyond Terror: The Films of Lucio Fulci by Stephen Thrower — Fulci has always been a terribly underrated director and, indeed, it’s easy to understand because, in many ways, he made movies with the specific aim of alienating and outraging his audience.  It requires a brave soul to take Fulci on his own terms and fortunately, Stephen Thrower appears to be one.  Along with the expected chapters on Fulci’s Beyond Trilogy and on Zombi 2, Thrower also devotes a lot of space to Fulci’s lesser known works.  Did you know, for instance, that before he became the godfather of gore, Fulci specialized in making comedies?  Or that he also directed two very popular adaptations of White Fang?  Thrower also examines Fulci’s often forgotten westerns as well as his postapocalyptic sci-fi films.  And, best of all, Thrower offers up a defense of the infamous New York Ripper that, when I read it, actually forced me to consider that oft-maligned film in a new light.  That said, Thrower does admit to being as confused by Manhattan Baby as everyone else.

4) Immoral Tales by Cathal Tohill and Pete Toombs — Tohill and Toombs offer an overview of European “shock” cinema and some of the genre’s better known masters.  The book contains perhaps the best critical examination of the work of Jean Rollin ever written.  The authors also examine the work of Jesus Franco and several others.  This is a great book that reminds us that the Italians aren’t the only ones who can make a great exploitation film.

3) Eaten Alive by Jay Slater — This book offers an overview of the Italian film industry’s legendary cannibal and zombie boom.  Along with reviewing every Italian movie to feature even the slightest hint of cannibalism or the living dead (this is one of the few books on Italian cinema that discusses both Pasolini and Lucio Fulci as equals), Eaten Alive also features some very revealing interviews with such iconic figures as Catriona MacColl, Ian McCullough, and especially Giovanni Lombardo Radice.  Radice, in fact, also contributes a memorable “guest” review of one of the movies featured in the book.  (“What a piece of shit!” the review begins.)  Memorable reviews are also contributed by Troma film founder Lloyd Kaufman who brilliantly (and correctly) argues that Cannibal Holocaust is one of the greatest films ever made and Ramsey Campbell who hilariously destroys Umberto Lenzi’s infamous Nightmare City.

2) The Book of the Dead by Jamie Russell — If, like all good people, you love zombies then you simply must do whatever it takes to own a copy of this book.  Starting with such early masterpieces as White Zombie and I Walked With A Zombie, Russell proceeds to cover every subsequent zombie film up through George Romero’s Land of the Dead.  Russell offers up some of the best commentaries ever written on Romero’s Dead films, Fuci’s Beyond Trilogy, Rollin’s Living Dead Girl, and Spain’s Blind Dead films.   The pièce de résistance, however, is an appendix where Russell describes and reviews literally ever zombie film ever made.

1)  All The Colors Of the Dark by Tim Lucas  — This is it.  This is the Holy Grail of All Film Books.  If you’ve ever asked yourself if any book is worth paying close to 300 dollars, now you have your answer.  This one is.  Tim Lucas offers up the most complete biography of director Mario Bava ever written.  In fact, this may be the most complete biography of any director ever written!  Lucas examines not only Bava’s life but also every single movie that Bava was ever in any way connected to, whether as a director or as a cameraman or as the guy in charge of the special effects.  This is 1,128 pages all devoted to nothing but the movies.  This is the type of book that makes me thankful to be alive and I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Tim Lucas for writing it.

The Daily Grindhouse: The New York Ripper (dir. by Lucio Fulci)

Posted on by Arleigh

I’ve decided to share my love of grindhouse films by posting periodical daily grindhouse choices. To inaugurate this new feature I’ve chosen a favorite early 80’s grindhouse flick straight from the mind of the maestro himself, Lucio Fulci.

The New York Ripper is one of Fulci’s contribution to the Italian cinema genre of gialli films. Giallo (gialli – plural) films have a colorful, no pun intended, history in Italian filmmaking and it’s Golden Age last from the 70’s all through the mid-80’s when the public’s appetite for them started to wane. This  Lucio Fulci entry into the giallo genre was not his first but it was one of his most infamous one’s for the fact that many people thought it’s depiction of women and their deaths on-screen was labeled as extremely misogynistic and cruel. The New York Ripper wasn’t even one of the better films in Fulci body of work, but the label of misogynism and having been banned from many countries or being shown only as a X-rated feature film brought it attention and made it a staple in the so-called “grindhouse” cinemas that were prevalent in the 70’s and 80’s.

The film liberally lifts its ideas from the famous “Jack the Ripper” true-crime investigation and transplants it, where else, but New York City. The killings were brutal to the point that I understood the outrage many had over them. What made this film a favorite of mine is not the controversy revolving over calls of misogynism or the near-pornographic scenes of violence, but the killer himself. As you shall see in the attached trailer for the film the duck voice and quacking you will hear is not a joke added into the trailer but part of the film’s titular character’s personality.

Yes, ladies and gents…Donald Duck is the New York Ripper!

Review: Zombie (dir. by Lucio Fulci)

Posted on by Arleigh

1979 saw the release of a film titled Zombi 2. It was suppose to be an unofficial sequel to Romero’s own Dawn of the Dead which was released in Italy under the title of Zombi. many thought this pseudo-sequel was a way to cash-in on the success of Romero’s film in Italy. This wasn’t true for the fact that it’s director and producers had already been working on their own zombie film as Romero started on Dawn of the Dead. It was by coincidence that both were released within the same year and in order to try and tie the two films together their titles reflected it.

Lucio Fulci’s Zombi 2 (or just plain Zombie in the US) has no connection whatsoever with Romero’s own Dawn of the Dead except for the zombies and the rules governing their destruction. This is not to say that Fulci’s Zombi 2 wasn’t good. In fact, I would say that Zombi 2 was, and still a great horror movie that’s been unfairly compared with Romero’s ultimate zombie classic. The two films tell different type of stories even when sharing similar plot devices and rules. Where Romero used the backdrop of the zombie epidemic as a damning visual commentary on the growing consumerism culture in the United States, Fulci’s film eschews any such social observations and goes for pure horror instead.

Zombi 2 helped begin the Italian cinema’s love of zombie movies and Fulci’s film still stands as the best of the lot. Starring Tisa Farrow as Ann, the daughter of a missing doctor working in the Carribean, and Ian McCulloch as reporter Peter West who helps Ann try to solve the mystery of her father’s disappearance in one of the Carribean Islands. The only clue they have being the mysterious reappearance of a boat belong to Ann’s father. A drifting yacht which, when inspected by NY Harbor Patrol, a disfigured, obese man violently attacks one of the patrolmen before falling overboard into the city harbor. From that moment on, Ann and Peter head off to her father’s last location on the Carribean island of Matool. Once on Matool, Ann and Peter discover that one of her father’s colleagues, a Dr. Manard, has been trying to solve the mysterious disease, or curse as the native islanders call it, which her father became afflicted with. A disease which seem to kill those it infects and then return them to life to attack the living.

These two are soon joined by a vacationing couple who seem to have arrived on Matool at the worst time. Ann and Peter soon enlist the aid of Brian and Susan, but before they could solve the island’s deadly mystery the island’s dead, both past and recent, rise up from their resting place and doom the remaining inhabitants. One sequence involving these zombies has gone down in horror history as one of the most cringe-inducing scenes on film. It involves the torturously slow sequence where a woman’s head is dragged forward toward a door splinter aimed directly at the woman’s eye. This gore-sequence in addition to the scenes of the zombies attacking and feeding on the visiting Westerners and the remaining living islanders were very well done and all due to make-up FX master Giannetto de Rossi. There’s even a spectacular sequence where a zombie tries to attack and feed on a live shark. Even to this day I still marvel at whichever stuntman volunteered for that action shot.

Zombi 2 has been called a dumbed down attempt to capitalize on Dawn of the Dead. I wholeheartedly disagree with this obeservation. Zombi 2 was never meant to be socially relevant, but one whose only goal was the scare, disgust and disturb its audience with scenes of extreme violence and gore. In this respect Fulci succeeded with the final cut of Zombi 2. The acting itself was very well done considering that half the cast spoke in English as their natural language while the other half were saying their lines in Italian. The dubbing of the Italian-spoken lines were done particularly well. A rarity when it comes to dubbed films.

The final few minutes of Zombi 2 where the Matool survivors make it back to New York through its harbor makes for a great ending. With a city radio station recounting the growing zombie crisis which seemed to have begun while Ann and Peter were on Matool, the final shot of zombies walking on the pedestrian level of the Brooklyn Bridge with cars below them seeming to be rushing out of the city to escape the crisis still makes for a haunting scene. Lucio Fulci’s Zombi 2 might not have been the iconic, cultural and societal masterpiece that was Romero’s Dawn of the Dead, but it more than holds its own when seen as a pure horror film.