Tag Archives: horror films

June 28, 2015 · 5:10 pm

HEADLESS (2015) THE CULT FILM OF THE YEAR

HeadlessHEADLESS (2015) – Yes, Headless, one of the fictional films-within- the-film in the horror movie Found (2012) was released as a crowd-funded production earlier this year. Keeping consistent with the way Headless was presented in Found, the gore-drenched flick was filmed as if it was a “lost” horror movie from 1978.  

That faithfulness was necessary in this case, so please don’t hold it against Headless even if you’re growing weary of the faux-1970’s sub-genre of movies – a sub-genre that is threatening to become as crowded as found-footage films.

Shane Beasley stars as the skull-masked killer, whose real name is never revealed. Beasley has the perfect “look” for this largely silent role and his tormented eyes convey the suffering his character is revealed to have gone through during his childhood and early teen years. Not that the suffering excuses his grotesque crimes, it’s just presented as back-story, like in the Filipino horror film The Road (2011).   Continue reading →

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June 21, 2015 · 4:53 pm

FATHER’S DAY (2011): A 21st CENTURY CULT CLASSIC

Father's DayFATHER’S DAY (2011) – I DEMAND A TEAM-UP OF AHAB FROM FATHER’S DAY AND ASH WILLIAMS FROM THE EVIL DEAD FILMS (and upcoming television series).

Sorry, I had to get that out of my system right off the bat. Ahab, the eye-patch sporting hero of the Astron 6 horror film Father’s Day is in my opinion the one true successor to Bruce Campbell’s Ash Williams. And considering how unfair the ending of this movie is for Ahab and his two sidekicks a case could even be made for them replacing Ash as the most royally screwed character in the history of gore-soaked horror comedies.     

It’s difficult to review this dark, grotesque gem without resorting to a series of catch phrases like “Goes where Dead Alive and similar movies failed to go” or “What Grindhouse hath wrought” or even “Twink and Walnut: They’re NOT Muppets!” Let me start with a more practical line: Do not watch this movie if you can not handle the most offensive violence, concepts, gore and deranged sexuality imaginable. 

Father's Day 2The overall style of this flick is the faux-1970’s grindhouse style made fashionable by (what else) Grindhouse but for my money Father’s Day is much more entertaining than Planet of Terror or Death Proof. It also doesn’t become a slave to its style like the faux-1980’s movies House of the Devil and Beyond the Black Rainbow.

Father’s Day deals with the Father’s Day Killer, a demented man named Chris Fuchman (pronounced … well, I’m sure you can guess) who rapes fathers, devours their penises and then kills them. Get ready for a series of scenes in which older men who have “Dad Bodies” with pudgy butts get taken from behind by the morbidly obese Fuchman (Mackenzie Murdock). No cutaways. The action is front and center. And that includes the penis-eating. At any rate the Father’s Day murders are just the tip of a Satanic iceberg of evil.   Continue reading →

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October 31, 2014 · 12:02 am

FIVE ZOMBIE FILMS THAT ARE ACTUALLY UNIQUE

HAPPY HALLOWEEN! If you’re like me you’re bored with all of the zombie and pseudo-zombie films that seem to come out every few months. The 21st Century is as mired in tiresome, cookie-cutter zombie flicks as the 1980’s were in tiresome, cookie-cutter slasher flicks.

Here is a look at five films which, while technically classified as zombie films at least adopt unique perspectives and don’t follow established formulas.

Maleficia

Maleficia

MALEFICIA (1998) – This offbeat item from France was directed by Antoine Pellissier, who was an actual practicing physician at the time so viewers can rest assured that the looks they get at the insides of slaughtered human beings are reasonably accurate (I’m kidding.)

The 1860 setting should appeal to Goths but the ENORMOUS amounts of blood and gore will satisfy even fans of the most graphically violent zombie films. A few vampires eventually show up, too, in addition to the zombies if you’re looking for a little variety.

A family is on their way by carriage to a castle they’ve inherited from a relative involved in secret occult activities. Enroute they come across a Satanic ritual with naked humans being sacrificed by way of crucifixions intentionally staged as blasphemous parodies of the crucifixion of Christ.   Continue reading →

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October 27, 2014 · 8:53 pm

THREE MORE BAD MOVIE CLASSICS FOR HALLOWEEN

Blood SongHalloween month continues here at Balladeer’s Blog! In previous years I’ve run my list of The Top Eleven Neglected Bad Movie Classics for Halloween and even a followup list of eleven more. The links to those lists are below. Right now here’s a look at three more classically bad horror flicks for the season.

BLOOD SONG (1982) – Singer Frankie Avalon as a 1980’s- style slasher villain! The godfather’s Luca Brasi (Lenny Montana) as a co-star and co-producer! Who could possibly resist that? Frankie plays a homicidal maniac who escapes from an insane asylum with his beloved flute/recorder type thingee.

Turns out years earlier a girl played by Donna Wilkes – soon to star as Angel herself – got a blood transfusion from Psycho Frankie. In this movie’s logic-free universe that means that she has a mental link with our mad slasher. This link is causing him to track her down to kill her with the single-minded fury that Mike Myers showed toward Jaime Lee Curtis in the Halloween movies. Continue reading →

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October 26, 2014 · 2:13 pm

ZOMBIES OF MONTICELLO (2013): HORROR FILM REVIEW

Jefferson in his favorite mink stole.

Jefferson in his favorite mink stole.

ZOMBIES OF MONTICELLO (2013) – Halloween month continues at Balladeer’s Blog with this review of cult director Eddie Wozniak’s blood-soaked combination of horror and commentary.

Learn the REAL cause of Thomas Jefferson’s death on July 4th, 1826! On the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence the zombified corpses of all of Jefferson’s dead slaves rise from their graves and besiege him and his extended family in the Jefferson mansion at Monticello!

The pompous hypocrite who penned noble words about freedom and equality while OWNING other human beings tries everything to wipe out the undead legions pressing in on all sides. Continue reading →

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October 18, 2014 · 10:32 pm

FOUR GRUESOME YET NEGLECTED HORROR FILMS

Night of the Scarecrow

Night of the Scarecrow

Halloween month continues here at Balladeer’s Blog! This time around I’ll examine four neglected horror films that are thoroughly macabre and are certainly graphically gruesome enough for today’s audiences but for some reason don’t have the followings they deserve. 

4. NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW (1995) – A big reason for this film getting lost in the shuffle is no doubt the fact that it is frequently confused with Dark Night of the Scarecrow, a telefilm with Charles Durning. This flick is in a whole different category. A warlock in 1600s America is killed by the holy roller townspeople, with his soul being trapped in a scarecrow and his bones buried in a coffin beneath that scarecrow.

In the 1990s an accident revives the warlock’s soul and unbinds the scarecrow, which sets out for revenge on the descendants of his killers. The scarecrow spent Continue reading →

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October 17, 2014 · 10:21 pm

THE MONSTER (1925): SILENT HORROR FILM

Halloween month continues at Balladeer’s Blog with this look at a neglected silent horror film.

Lon Chaney as the mad scientist Dr Ziska in The Monster.

Lon Chaney as the mad scientist Dr Ziska in The Monster.

THE MONSTER (1925) – The incomparable Lon Chaney, “the man of a thousand faces” starred as the mad scientist Dr Ziska in this horror film that is often neglected because of its annoyingly heavy use of comic relief moments. Dr Ziska is in the habit of engineering car accidents for various innocent motorists and their Model T’s. Then his lackeys abduct them and take them to the mad doctor’s sanitarium which is far removed from the nearest town or city. Continue reading →

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October 7, 2014 · 10:03 pm

SPOOKIES (1986) – A NEGLECTED BAD MOVIE CLASSIC

Spookies 1SPOOKIES (1986) – Halloween month continues here at Balladeer’s Blog with a look at a bad movie classic that deserves a Plan 9-sized cult. I mean who does this movie have to sleep with in order to be better known?

Spookies is loaded with laughable and outrageous monsters, acting that porn stars would dismiss as amateurish and gore effects that go from wincingly realistic to childishly weak and back again throughout the flick.

The reason for the uneven tone is that Spookies is yet another example of a bad film that was not completed and then was later combined with new footage to slap together a movie with a long enough running time for theatrical release. They Saved Hitler’s Brain, Monster A Go-Go, The Pink Angels plus Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny are four of the best-known examples of these hybrid monstrosities.  

For obvious reasons the characters in the original footage and the completion footage can never interact in the film and part of the fun for lovers of bad movies lies in the awkward lengths the filmmakers go to to try to hide the cut-and- paste nature of their movie. Continue reading →

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October 17, 2013 · 1:55 am

FOUR ZOMBIE FILMS THAT ARE ACTUALLY UNIQUE

Balladeer’s Blog’s month-long celebration of Halloween continues! If you’re like me you’re bored with all of the zombie and pseudo-zombie films that seem to come out every few months. The 21st Century is as mired in tiresome, cookie-cutter zombie flicks as the 1980’s were in tiresome, cookie-cutter slasher flicks.

Here is a look at four films which, while technically classified as zombie films at least adopt unique perspectives and don’t follow established formulas.

Living Dead Girl

Living Dead Girl

1. THE LIVING DEAD GIRL (LA MORTE VIVANTE) (1982) – French director Jean Rollin helmed this introspective, touching and at times even poignant rendition of a zombie film. If you’re not familiar with Rollin’s work he often starts with a prosaic premise but then flies off into strikingly original territory with it.   

La Morte Vivante starts off with the trope of toxic waste artificially preserving and ultimately reviving the corpse of heiress Catherine Valmont (Francoise Blanchard). The barrels of toxic waste have been illegally stored in the Valmont family’s catacombs over the course of two years without their knowledge and Catherine’s first action when restored to life is to dispatch the men dumping the waste in swift and bloody fashion. Another corpse in the catacombs with Catherine is Continue reading →

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October 10, 2013 · 8:18 pm

MEXICAN MOVIE MONSTERS FOR HALLOWEEN

brainiacWelcome back to Balladeer’s Blog’s month-long celebration of Halloween! 
Mexican horror films of the 1950’s and 1960’s deserve to be as well known as the Hollywood horror films from the 30’s and 40’s. Just as Universal Studios churned out a series of memorable movies featuring the likes of Dracula, Frankenstein, the Wolfman and the Mummy, studios from south of the border went on to give the world equally outstanding creatures.

These horror films boasted Universal- style production values and beautiful black & white cinematography combined with uniquely Mexican twists on horror themes as well as more sensuality and lurid violence than Hollywood had dared to present. This list aims to introduce Mexi- Monsters to younger viewers who may not be familiar with them. I’m omitting generic monsters like the various vampires from Mexican horror films (including Fabian Forte, Cristina Ferrare and a descendant of Nostradamus) and the werewolf wrapped in mummy bandages from Face of the Screaming Werewolf.  

7. THE BRAINIAC (1962) – Mexican title El Baron Del Terror. Many may be outraged at Continue reading →

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