It’s your old pal, The Primal Root, and to celebrate the holiday season I’ve decided to throw a Trashmas New Year’s Bash over at my pad and everyone is invited! That includes YOU! But beforehand we’re checking out an all time favorite Trash Cinema Slasher film from 1981 called ‘Home Sweet Home’. It’s supposedly a holiday themed horror movie, but a turkey dinner does not a holiday make, gang. In fact no one even mentions what holiday it is! From what I understand I think it’s supposed to be Thanksgiving?
I digress, get prepared for feral children, satanic electric guitar playing magical Jewish mimes, Body by Jake, body builder body glaze, sex with your pants on, spanish racial sterotypes, bribing cops with “bazooms”, roid rage, flattened grannies, disapearing balls, hostage negotiations, the missing peas and so much more! It’s The Primal Root’s Rotten Reviews Episode 27: Home Sweet Home! Gather round and share it with those you love.
Thank you for all your support and for spreading the word! See you in 2013!
Growing up in a household that could afford premium cable, as a youngster, there was no greater pleasure than staying up late, hunkering down on the sofa in the darkened living room, and catching the sick, twisted morality tale that was HBO’s ‘Tales from the Crypt.’ Being a child whose love for the macabre and horrific was rotted deep within me and growing more apparent on a daily basis, this was MY must see TV. In my younger years, Nickelodeon’s ‘Are You Afraid of the Dark?’ along with old, dusty, issues of E.C. comicss ‘The Vault of Horror’ and ‘Tales from the Crypt’ had wet my pallet. The promise of a fun, vivid, gory, lesson in how being an asshole will surely end in a fate often worse than death wrapped up in one nifty thirty minute package made ‘Tales from the Crypt’ an irresistible temptation. Add the ever present possibility of bare female breasts, and my adolescent self couldn’t refuse.
Hell, my adult self still can’t refuse.
Then, in 1995, I was traipsing through Tallahassee Florida’s long dead Oak Lake Six movie theater on my way to see ‘The Brady Bunch Movie’ when I spotted poster that dropped my jaw to the floor and filled my heart with sticky, black, diabolical joy. Oh yes, ‘Tales from the Crypt’ was releasing a movie called “Demon Knight.’ Needless to say, this was the greatest news my 13 year old self had ever heard. The poster featured a shot of the Crypt Keeper smiling ghoulishly and peering over blue lensed, John Lennon style sun glasses, holding open his epic, and seemingly endless, book tales as slimy, razor toothed demons spewed forth all being led by an slightly aggravated looking bald fellow in a trench coat with his arm outstretched pointing right at my scrawny, freshly teenaged face. I knew, in my misguided, freshly teenaged heart, this was going to be the greatest movie ever made.
Sadly, I wouldn’t be able to talk my Mom into letting me see it until it was released on VHS. I rented Tales from the Crypt presents Demon Knight, slipped the tape into my VCR, and braced myself for the glory. Dear reader, Demon Knight catered to everything my adolescent heart could possibly desire. Here’s how it goes down…
The action takes place in a dilapidated boarding house that was previously a church where the home’s misfit group of residents (prostitute, laid off postal worker, drunken bum Dick Miller, etc.) find themselves in the middle of an ancient battle between good and evil. See, there’s a drifter named Stryker played by infinitely likeable character actor, William Sadler, playing it straight, earnest, and desperate. Stryker, The Demon Knight, finds his way to this boarding house, thanks to a largely unexplained supernatural star circle compass tattoo in the palm of his hand, seeking shelter. Styker is being stalked down by a slick, seductive, hilarious form of evil incarnate known only as The Collector. The Collector is played by Billy Zane, who is obviously having a field day with such a fun part. In retrospect this might be the high water mark of his career. Which is rather sad.
Anyhoo, The Collector is trying to get his hands on ‘The Key’ which Stryker is protecting. This key holds the blood of Christ as well as the blood of previous Demon Knights. The fate of all humanity hangs in the balance on this night, in this boarding home, because this key is the last of seven The Collector needs in order to unleash Hell on earth. It soon becomes a show down in the old Night of the Living Dead, Assault on Precinct 13 style, as The Collector brings forth an army of vicious, mucousy, pierced up demons that look like char grilled Muppets looking to rip the into meaty chunks anyone who stands between them and The Key. The Collector, on the other hand, finds his own way in through the use of seduction and the promise of granting his victim’s fantasies which leads to some of ‘Demon Knights” more interesting sequences. Needless to say, many will die, few will live, some will get fire pissed on them by Billy Zane, and one character will fulfill their destiny. Oh yeah, it’s one of those type of parties.
That’s the basic run down of what’s going on in this movie. The mythology surrounding The Key, the Demon Knights and their Highlander-esque back story is something I could honestly devote a whole article to. Plus there’s the obligatory Crypt Keeper bookends to the film that don’t really add much, but it’s cool that the our old pal, The Crypt Keeper, is holding down the fort and spewing the same old eye rolling puns and one liners.
‘Demon Knight delivered, and for about six months, it was among my absolute favorites and solidified my deep, abiding, love for Trash Cinema. It had graphic violence delivered both horrifically and humorously. Gratuitous and plentiful bare female breasts. A ridiculously fun villain in the form of The Collector, and likeable and enigmatic hero in Stryker, plus a great cast of veteran character actors like Dick Miller, CCH Pounder, and Charles Fleischer as well as a few folks yet to hit their peak like Jada Pinkett , Thomas Haden Church and um, Traci Bingham? Plus, a bizarre cameo by John Laroquette who still seems like a strange choice to me…The morality play aspect of the television series falls by the wayside a bit, but the sick, twisted black comedy is intact and even a bit amplified.
Tales from the Crypt presents Demon Knight isn’t a great film, not by a long shot, but it sure is a Hell of a lot of fun. And at the end of the day isn’t that precisely what you want from this kind of flick? It’s dumb, rude, dirty, sick, over the top and exploitative. It’s a guilty pleasure of the highest order. It’s a dark minded, neon eyed, spook house, horror show of a movie that is only interested in kicking ass, tossing the gruel at it’s audience and letting the chips fall where they may. It’s the kind of horror film where you walk out with a smile knowing that you’ve had a blast.
My 13-14 year old self was an instant fan. The poster adorned my wall throughout my middle school years and I sang the praises of ‘Demon Knight’ to all my horrified friends. I watched it nearly every weekend for a span of about six months before moving on to other bizarre, awesome, trashy films. However, the young, teenager inside me still holds this film very close to his strange, trash loving little heart.
Stay Trashy!
It’s 2003. Halle Berry has been on a roll. X-men, Swordfish, Die Another Day, X2 and then oh.. oh Gothika. Well it makes sense you can’t get to play a Mutant, Spy, and a woman who shows her breasts and not expect to get stuck into a flop. To be fair this movie isn’t a TOTALFLOP. I’d give it 4/10. It gets that extra point taking it from a 3 to a 4 simply because I didn’t pay 10 dollars to see it in a theatre. If I have to sit in a theatre, surrounded by chatting Cathy’s checking their cellphones and playing angry birds AND be disappointed - then it’s terrible. But if it’s a “meh” kind of flick that I can watch whenever I want for basically nothing then I have to judge it differently. Theenvironment being my leather office chair and a computer monitor vs. a huge amazingly beautiful raven black screen that depicts images and bass sounds that prove movies only have 1 volume – 11.
Above you’ll see the opening scene, yeah that’s Penelope Cruz who plays Chloe. That’s how the movie starts. 50 something seconds in and I am looking at her face, a blurred background and an amazing quote to get the ball rolling.
“He opened me like a flower of pain and it felt goooood. He sank into me and set me on fire, like he always does. Made me burn from the inside out.”
Of course this is a great catcher. I’m 50 seconds in and I’m listening to a poetic quote about fucking. If I was a fish I’ve taken the bait. I am curious, I want to know what is going on and sadly like a fish, when I finally get pulled in on the line at the end of the movie – I am not excited to learn that I am on a boat, on ice and will soon be dinner. The end is a disappointment, like the life of a caught fish. If you watch a lot of horror movies you’ll pick up on the foreshadowing, the small fragments in the first 10 minutes that reveal and open the entire movie’s plot to those who are movie fanatics (and book fanatics too you guys get to be labeled as analytical and smart!) For the rest of you – you’ll see some of it coming and even the final ending twist, well the last 2 they throw at you are predictable to just about everyone. The initial twist isn’t as predictable but the movie’s two themes do add to most of the foreshadowing.
The themes? Water/Reflections and that ever fun loving “Is what is going on Supernatural, Psychological, or a little of both? Is it all in her head, is Dr. Grey crazy? Is Chloe telling the truth and what about Robert Downey Jr? Oh yeah he’s in it playing that quirky but ever loving character minus the Iron Man facial hair and that badass suit of his. Oh and since I haven’t mentioned it yet. Dr. Grey is a head psychologist at a clinic for the insane. Her Husband played by Charles S. Dutton is everyone’s boss. Downey is her co-worker who you can tell has the school boy crush on her and the Sherriff is John Carroll Lynch.
The soundtrack is horror movie standards. Hard piano notes in-between conversations, whispers in the wind of a female voice and that light melodic yet haunting track to alert you that shit is going to hit the fan. Oh and Limp Bizkit’s “Behind Blue Eyes” as the ending credit track. Granted Halle Berry doesn’t have blue eyes but since Fred Durst aka Limp Bizkit does I guess that passes as credibility. This is my warning that going out to buy it for background music is a waste of your time and your money.
The movies camera angles, jump shots, fade in’s and other transitions are fine. They don’t get too annoying and there is even a scene where Dr. Grey is remembering something SUPER TERRIBLE THAT SHE HAS DONE (oh God no!) and it plays the scene backwards, aka like a VHS tape rewinding. Yes there is a fast lighted dream sequence with the expected blood thrown against the wall in long splashes, screaming, camera shaking and more lighting gone to hell – but, BUT!!! Gothika does this right. By the time I realized this kind of shit was going on it was over with. Like seeing a TORNADO land and going “oh fuck I gotta go…” and then the Tornado is gone before you can string together a listing of your favorite words emphasized by “FUCK.”
SPOILER ALERT – So this is where you stop reading if you haven’t seen the movie or have any intention of seeing it and want to be surprised. You should take note that you won’t really be that surprised because the movie is not as twisty in plot as a twizzler, it’s more twisty like the yellow brick road. There are some turns and twists but the damn thing’s golden and laid out pretty straightforward. (See comparison below)
The movie totally goes off its questioning if everything you are watching is either real or fake by blatantly pointing out that Dr. Grey is possessed and that’s what leads her to kill her husband the pervert who kidnaps girls, rapes and tortures them and then kills them with the help of the tattooed sheriff whose also been raping Penelope Cruz every night. Did you catch all that?
None of it is in her mind so even if she was on drugs like Thorazine that great question of “is this real?” that the viewer is supposed to struggle with is a mute point before the halfway marker. We’ll even ignore the ghost kid at the end who the bus drives right through – reaching out desperately for help from Dr. Grey. Also let’s ignore Dr. Greys ending speech about solving her problem, locking it up, throwing away the key etc. Obviously she can see dead people, it’s what happens when the head bosses daughter gets raped, tortured and killed by your ever so loving husband and then possess you and has you brutally slaughter him with an axe and bathe in his blood. Oh and for all of you who saw Halle Berry naked in swordfish, no this won’t be occurring here. Though like any good horror movie stereotype there is a shower scene. With a dozen or two women – whose faces get all distorted after Dr. Grey lets the cold water hit her face, distorting her perception of reality (or possession by evil natural spirit influenced event – whatever.) Oh and if you do see this and you can’t figure out the sheriff was in on it most of the time and is the tattooed asshole then you need to watch more horror. I feel like the first 30 minutes the movie was decent, and then it all became a huge pile of crap. Not just because I could predict and smell said shit, but because it was like they had me hooked and then this is where they lead me. They lead me here. Unlike b/c/d horror films who don’t hide how terrible they are. This is a high class trash. A huge pile of shit covered in gold glitter. Its shit but made to look nice.
4/10 if you can watch it for free and at home.
3/10 if you are somehow able to pay money and watch this in a theatre. (So instead give me your money or donate it to a third world country or a good cause.)
This movie isn’t torturous so it doesn’t get the GITMO SEAL OF APPROVAL but it didn’t leave me feeling like I just went through an excellent story, experienced some form of horror and left with a smile on my face and popcorn salt in my beard.
Netflix believes I would like these movies based on Gothika:
Haven’t seen The Glass House but the first two are true horror classics and in no way should be compared to Gothika – unless it’s opposite day.
I haven’t had cable television in over a decade. I refuse to pay for something that every time I flip it on I feel as if my brain is steadily being churned into chunky apple sauce. This is not to say that I don’t know what’s on there. On occasion, I have sat and witnessed what most of our nation happily plops down and allows to be broadcast into our living rooms every evening. You know, for the entire family to enjoy. Let’s just say, it’s mildly disturbing. What are the repercussions of such resignation on our society? A world where our entire culture and society is saturated with celebrity gossip, ugly, degrading reality television, and political pundits who would rather preach hate and intolerance than have an intelligent and respectful discussion?
Bobcat Goldthwait’s latest directorial effort, “God Bless America”, takes on this disheartening concept in the form of a deeply dark, satirical comedy. It’s got something for everyone who’s sick of the “Oh, no, you didn’t!” generation that’s grown up planted on a couch, glued to the screen, all but lobotomized, and no longer concerned with discerning thought, open-mindedness, respect, common courtesy, or even kindness. It’s a generation of people who demand respect, but don’t give it in return, who demand to be heard but refuse to listen, who know they come first and the rest of the world just doesn’t fucking matter. Of course, this is a “fictional” world that our protagonist, Frank, inhabits, right? A middle aged, middle class, divorced parent who also happens to be a war veteran. He must deal with his obnoxious neighbors who don’t seem to mind their 24/7/365 wailing infant, and talk loudly and incessantly (over their screaming offspring) about occurrences on their favorite TV shows and the latest gossip on Bradgelina.
Frank is aware of this drought in the human spirit. That we have sold it for a fast food and soulless culture that worships greed and selfishness over compassion and selflessness. Frank sits in his living room flipping through the channels as photoshopped pictures of President Obama dressed up as Adolf Hitler are promoted as some kind of warped sense of reality, a random, class-act reality TV star pulls out her bloody tampon and angrily splats it across the face of her costar who, I can only assume, crossed her (the details of their quarrel are lost among beeped-out dialogue). It’s a sick, sad world Frank lives in. And not even he ever-cool “Daria” kind. To make matters worse, Frank has just lost his job, been informed he has an inoperable, fatal brain tumor growing in his noggin, and his pre-teen daughter refuses to come visit him flipping her shit over receiving a Blackberry instead of an iPhone for her birthday.
Frank can’t take it anymore, but just as he wraps his lips around the barrel of a Glock the blue light of the television screen spills over him. ”My Super Sweet 16″ is on and an entitled high schooler is cursing and berating her parents in a self-righteous rage after she is presented with a top o’ the line vehicle that is NOT the one she had envisioned. Frank comes to the epiphany that the gun he’s holding is pointed in the wrong direction. Our hero ends up on a road trip to off the outrageous brat he blames for his own daughter’s (and the general world’s) ridiculously selfish behavior. However, he, also, winds up inspiring and being inspired by a teenage girl, Roxy, who’s just as disillusioned and angry at the egomaniacally brain-dead society they are forced to abide. Or are they? They lock, load, and go on a rampage laying waste to those assholes who talk and text during movies, jerks who take up two full parking spaces, and hate mongers who stand at the side of the road holding signs declaring “God Hates Fags”. Frank and Roxy gun them down and mow them over with glee. I can’t help but chuckle at the carnage as these people are decimated and punished for being a part of a “civilization that is no longer interested in being civilized”.
As is the case with Bobcat’s previous work, God Bless America will have you laughing with dark revelry as those who make everyday life a constant struggle finally mess with with the wrong nice guy. Also typical of Bobcat, despite the deeply-etched satirical pitch-black edge, the filmmaker manages to imbue this work with genuine, human emotion, poignancy, and thought-provoking pathos. Joel Murray, the instantly recognizable character, is amazing as Frank. He infuses the role with so much heart and believability that you cannot help but root for the guy, whether due to or despite his impressive body count. Roxy,Tara Lynne Barr, as Frank’s young sidekick and voice of the younger generation is a firecracker, a natural whose sassy, fun performance, keeps the film well-paced and peppy.
God Bless America is a sometimes graphic, often profane and funny for most of its running time. However, by film’s end it starts to register that this is the same violent and malicious motivation that drives those who blow up abortion clinics or lynch people because of the color of their skin. The killers we profess to despise believe they are murdering those “who deserve to die” too, right? The first 45 minutes of God Bless America starts out blazingly funny as it lampoons pop culture and society at large, but as it winds to a close the viewer may begin to wonder, have both Frank and Roxy steadily descended into the mean-spirited people they were trying to destroy? God Bless America is hilarious, tragic, sometimes uncomfortable, frequently challenging, and totally uncompromising. It’s the kind of film that doesn’t come around very often, anymore. One that asks some nasty questions, takes an angry stance, and asks the audience to internalize these things. That they sincerely ask themselves just what the fuck they make of it all.
And keep your eyes peeled for TV’s Frank from MST3K in a brief cameo. Guck-Ga-Yuuuuw!
Okay Gang, I’m going to try REAL hard not to spoil anything about “The Innkeepers.” You have my word that spoilers will be kept to a minimum.
I remember hearing of Ti West’s “The House of the Devil” through the horror fan grapevine as a cinematic experience those who watched either loved or hated. I decided to give it a go and became a member of the former category. I loved “The House of the Devil” and felt it’s quirky, patient approach to building suspense and creating a genuine atmosphere of dread was so refreshing it almost felt totally new in a cinematic culture where most films are slashed to ribbons in the editing process and paced to the heart rate of a Starbucks junkie. Sure, this technique is nothing new and was perfected by the likes of Hitchcock and De Palma and Carpenter, but to see a young, fresh out the gates filmmaker like Ti West utilize a form of cinematic story telling that seemed all but forgotten instantly made the young man an artist I wanted to keep tabs on.
Enter, “The Innkeepers”, West’s most recent effort. The story of two slacker employees Claire (Sara Paxton from The Last House on the Left remake) and Luke (Pat Healy from Rescue Dawn) of the very soon to be shut down and demolished Yankee Pedlar Inn, a three story, turn of the century kind of place with awesome wallpaper, hard wood floors and the obligatory legend of a tragic death and enduring haunting therein. As the last two employees on staff at the Yankee Pedlar, Clair and Luke take the opportunity to down some cheap beer and launch a full scale investigation into the legendary haunting of deceased bride-to-be, Madeline O’Malley which Luke claims to have encountered on several occasions.
The duo busts out their recording equipment to try and capture some EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomenon) and set the stage for the possibility of a ghostly encounter. And honestly, one gets the impression that these two are investigating more our of sheer boredom than any passionate interest. However, as some curious happenings begin to manifest around Clair and Luke they are advised by one of the only guests they have that weekend, Leanne (Kelly McGillis from Top Gun (!) ) who is a former TV actress turned psychic medium. She comes to Claire as a friend and offers a possible guide to the spirit world while also offering some well timed significant New Age wisdom and a dark warning…
“The Innkeepers” is one scary mother fucking movie. It finally dawned on me that, really, if there’s one genre of horror sure to really get me rattled it’s the kind that involves hauntings and ghosts. Ghosts are a tricky subject in horror movies because they can be handled improperly like they were in the remake of “Paranormal Activity” (2009) or “Insidious” (2011) where everything is revealed, everything explained and everything is showcased in the light of day and leaves nothing to the imagination. I have always been of the opinion that scariest thing we will ever face is that which we don’t understand and what’s left up to us to imagine. Always, this will be far more frightening than anything a filmmaker and his effects crew could ever create and showcase.
For the majority of “The Innkeepers” we join Claire and Luke in their final, modest, quest to seek any kind of proof of the supernatural at The Yankee Peddler. We see only what they see, hear what they hear and many times adopt their point of view as the camera track closely behind them keep the frame claustrophobic and tense as the viewer joins them in the investigation. Often there’s nothing but silence or the hum of static piping through headphones as they listen to what they’re recording. I was on the edge of my seat in anticipation being drawn in both wanting something to happen and being incredibly fucking nervous as to the when and what might be revealed or heard. It’s a film that realizes we’ve seen this sort of film before and that we are familiar with the beats. “The Innkeepers” defies our expectations and repeatedly scares the shit out of the viewer. They may be jump scares, but they are well earned and serve the purpose of the story at hand.
Not only are the scares and techniques used to deliver them excellent, but so is the cast at hand. Our star player, Sara Paxton gives a very genuine and game performance as the adorable, nerdy slacker, Claire. She finds herself in the center of the storm during the proceedings and manages to play up her distress well and also proves to be quite the comedian to boot. Paxton is imminently watchable and young actress I look forward to seeing more from. Pat Healy as Luke is a great foil to Claire and generates some great laughs with his deadpan, sarcastic performance. Like Paxton, Healy is called upon to both be very believably funny and terrified. The brother pulls it off in spades. Kelly McGillis is fantastic as the resident psychic, Leanne, a once famous TV star with a gift for communicating with the other side. As the films most prominent supporting player she proves believable and essential to the tale and really grounds the film in reality. “The Innkeepers” benefits greatly from her presence.
“The Innkeepers” brings to mind Kubrick’s “The Shining” by way of Kevin Smith’s “Clerks”. It’s the story of two intelligent but unmotivated young adults working a literal dead-end job and floating rudderless. When Clair is asked by Leanne what she does Claire can only respond with an awkward and unsure “I’m kind of between things.” as if she’s never given a single thought to what will be coming next for her. Claire and Luke are very real and well developed characters that feel like people we know. Hell, what might be even stranger is that these characters might even be many of us, stuck in lame jobs and having resigned ourselves to them with no clue as to how we could ever better our situation. These characters wonder the silent, ancient halls of The Yankee Peddler looking for the smallest evidence that there is something more there. Evidence that there could be any truth to legend of Madeline O’Malley. It may seem like a futile search to some, pointless even when faced with the crushing reality of oncoming unemployment, but the truth is that some of us might never find anything better than what we’ve got and grown accustomed to. Many find themselves in the exact same trap Claire and Luke find themselves in. Walking the halls of the place they can’t stand in a kind of purgatory.I can think of few things scarier than that.
Well, beside mother fucking ghosts…
The Innkeepers is an intelligent and brilliantly constructed horror film. One that doesn’t spoon feed it’s story or characters to the audience. The Yankee Peddler itself feels like a character int he film, much in the same way The Overlook Hotel played the same sort of significance in the proceedings of The Shining. Every hall tells a story, every room has witnessed thousands of tales unfold. One can only imagine what frightening memories such a place might have. And this is the ultimate strength if “The Inkeepers”, we are given the ammunition necessary to fill in the blanks and imagine many of the films horrors. Some are blatant and in your face, but “The Innkeepers” is a smart enough film to allow room for mystery, ambiguity and interpretation. The mark of truly good film is that it trust it’s audience and doesn’t talk down to it. “The Innkeepers” is just such a film.
It’s a slow burn that takes it’s time to build up the suspense and lay on the dread as thick as molasses while dropping in some well timed laughs and plenty of fun, snappy banter. Ti West knocked it out of the park with this one, yes, “The Innkeepers” is well worth the visit.
Before we get started, a big THANK YOU to my buddy Aslan for letting me borrow his VHS copy of this sucker. My eyes are open!
The evil ’80s, huh? The golden age of the yuppie, trickle down economics, Marty McFly, and satanic cults. Remember back to the early days of the 1980s when there was a nationwide rumor that grew to a near-hysterical panic over the stories that satanic cults were roaming the countryside looking for infants, valley girls and grandparents to sacrifice in the name of their dark master? Believe it or not, as people were rocking out to Bananrama and Soft Cell they were also all nervous about getting tied to an alter and being slit open to appease someone’s religious figure. All of this panic seemed to stem from the popularity and publicity generated by “Michelle Remembers”, an autobiography that documents a woman’s recollections under hypnosis of being forced to attend rituals performed by “The Church of Satan” back in the ’50s. An entertaining read, sure, but it was also a load of bullshit. No one was being abducted for the purpose of human sacrifice, especially not in the “ME” decade. Official investigations into the phenomenon turned up nothing and everyone in the U.S. seemed to move on when the ’90s rolled in. Well…most of us got over it…
http://freewestmemphis3.org/
Still, this couldn’t stop every filmmaker on the block from exploiting the decade’s unbridled fear of falling victim to satanism! Enter “NECROPOLIS”, the bargain-basement tale of a 300 year old, metal head, Satan worshiping, motorcycle riding witch from New Amsterdam by the name of Eva (LeeAnne Baker of “Riot on 42nd Street” and “Psychos in Love” fame)! This lady roams the seedy back alleys of ’80s New York searching for a virgin sacrifice in order to keep her youth, but not before resurrecting her cult members by draining the life force of “young” recovering junkies at a local halfway house and bursting out into random interpretive dance numbers in front of papier-mâché martian masks in back of crummy New York jewelry shops. At least I’m pretty sure that’s the plot of the film…
Our film opens in the late 1800s where two separate ceremonies are taking place simultaneously. There is a goofy looking young couple joining together in that holy union of marriage while our above-mentioned satanist witch is doing some kind of Jazzercise witchey Satan routine at the altar of her cobwebby, Hot Topic-esque lair which looks more suited to a performance on Head Banger’s Ball than it does to any kind of religious worship. Then again, what do I know, I’m not a satanist.
Before you can say “nauseatingly choppy cross-cutting” the bride has her throat slit, people cry and we fast forward to present day (1986) New York, New York where our witchy woman, Eva, now resides with her bleached blonde flattop, long red nails and more eyeliner than was used on all four Pirates of the Caribbean films combined. Really, it’s as if the top half of her head is painted black. I’m sure it’s a statement.
There are two subplots for the audience to chew on here. The first involves a priest running this sort of halfway house for wayward teens (all played by actors pushing 40) overcoming drug addictions, running away from broken homes or trying to give up spreading tail for money. He’s obviously not cut out for the job as just about everyone in his care ends up alone and being murdered by Eva who sucks out the murdered “teens’” souls and spews them forth in the form of ectoplasm from her six breasts (!!!) as she feeds her zombie cultist brethren back to life. Let me tell you, the feeding scene alone is worth the price of your time to sit through this sucker.
Our second plot involves the reincarnated married couple from the opening of the film. One is a crass, dimwitted Brooklyn detective who goes by the name “Billy” (Michael Conte) and the other is a red headed British journalist with grey teeth named Dawn (Jacquie Fitz). They meet and begin flirting at the scene of a halfway house homicide. Their eyes meet over the cold, bloody corpse of one of the local “youths” and they have an immediate connection. It’s like they’ve met before! They decide to get something to eat, because nothing perks up the appetite like crying preachers and dead children, and begin their whirlwind romance as star crossed, unappealing lovers!
The plot, obviously, doesn’t hold up to scrutiny but the film’s overriding cheap goofiness almost makes up for the lack of a coherent story or any method behind, or in front of, the camera. This is the single directing credit for writer/filmmaker Bruce Hickey and it’s kind of a shame. There are few filmmakers alive who make trash cinema with such purity! This thing is astonishingly bad from beginning to end and I love Necropolis for its commitment to being the strangest, most ridiculous movie it can possibly be. So, to Bruce, his cast and crew, we at The Trash Cinema Collective salute you for your strange little contribution to sleazy satanic horror cinema! Let’s face it, your movie is peerless.
The one thing I came away with from “Necropolis” (which, by the way, doesn’t feature a single cemetery), is that Satanists seem like they just want to have fun! Motorcycles, impromptu dance numbers, three times the normal amount of boobage, and dressing up like a Lady GaGa wannabe? Now that’s a woman I want to party with! Not everyday you meet a woman who excretes ectoplasm from her nipples. Is it wrong that I can’t help but imagine what breast ectoplasm tastes like? I like to think it tastes something like Hi-C’s Ecto-Cooler…
Man, The Blair Witch Project feels like it was ages ago…Well, here we are with another quickie cash in on the current super cheap “found footage” trend. This time instead of a ghost, alien or witch we’re dealing with the ever freaky prospect of exorcisms. A found footage concept that’s been done before recently and a bit better in 2010′s “The Last Exorcism”. Hey, at least that film managed to be even remotely entertaining for more than 5 minutes of it’s run time…
The Devil Inside is the story of a young woman looking to close a chapter in her life that’s plagued her since she was a child. Her mother’s condition which led her to slay three clergy members during her own exorcism. Mom was shipped off to Italy in order undergo treatment for her mental illness but her daughter Isabella isn’t so quick to rule out demonic possession. This is the mock-doc of Isabella’s trip to Italy to visit her mother where she encounters real life exorcists who take her out on dates to watch them work their brand of incompetence on young ladies who can pop ‘n’ lock like none other! This is the true story of when demons stop being polite and start getting real…
"True Sto-RAAAAY!" obscure?
Long gone are the days of the possessed spewing bile into preachers faces, no, nowadays they are more likely to spray you copious amounts of vagina blood like fruit punch squeezed forth from the little straw pocking out of the top of a Hi-C juice box. And that kind of shit is fun to watch. It’s freaky, it’s unnatural, and it is pretty gross (unless you’re into that sort of thing, in which case, this flick might get ya hot under the collar.) and it works. The strongest element of this film are these scenes of demonic possession and the battle to rid these folks of their hellish ailments. And these scenes are pretty captivating, the strongest of which, involves a priest performing a baptism on an infant.
The sad fact is, none of these scenes really mean much, because the filmmakers forgot the create interesting characters the audience could empathize with. Fernanda Andrade as Isabella seems completely void of emotion for the duration of the picture. During these intense, violent and over the top exorcism sequences (one of which involves her own mother) the camera every so often pans to Isabella for a reaction shot. And as the blood spews forth from splayed vaginas and priests that are as physically imposing as a five year old get tossed across rooms and into walls, Isabella’s typical reaction is utter boredom. This reaction pretty much sums up my reaction to the other 97% of The Devil Inside.
Dramatic recreation of the look on my face when "The Devil Inside" ended.
And in so lies the films ultimate weakness: dullness. There’s just nothing happening foe the majority of the film. We get some priests debating the whether exorcism is real or just mental illness (guess which debate wins out in the end!), people bickering, and montages of Isabella walking around Italy looking bored and uninterested. Now, I can;t be sure where the fault should really lie for such a boring film. I mean, this is supposed to be a documentary film gone wrong, correct? Depressingly enough, the guy behind the camera never comes off as a competent filmmaker to begin with. So do we blame the fictional documentary filmmaker? IS he supposed to suck at his profession? Or is it the actual filmmakers themselves who can’t put together a thoughtful, exciting, engaging film on the subject of mental illness, family ties, faith and possession? Why waste such a potentially good story on the same tired formula that Paranormal Activity has exploited for three movies?
Because people eat this shit up for some reason. 1. Have nothing interesting happen for 45 minutes of screen time. 2. Insert a loud dog barked 3. Watch everyone jump and scream in shock as your film takes the bold step of having something actually happen4. Profit. This is fucking LAZY film making, people. This is the kind of thing that gives the horror genre such a bad name. And this is the kind of vacuous, meaningless, fast food offerings the mainstream horror audience is fed and they slurp up as if it’s filet mignon. Mainstreamers, you have steadily acquired a taste for Grade-A dookie. Yes, you are being served heaping spoonfuls of shit. There’s nothing interesting here. Nothing thoughtful or truly horrifying nor is there anything campy or fun about The Devil Inside. It simply exists with just about nothing to offer.
Despite some relatively strong performances from supporting players Simon Quarterman and Evan Helmuth as two young renegade exorcists who aid Isabella in her quest and Suzan Crowley as Isabella’s Mother, Maria Rossi, who pretty much steals the show with every scene in which she appears. She, alone, nearly makes the film worth it. If only we had more time with her. The film also kicks it into high gear towards the end of it’s running time where it even hints at becoming interesting. Really. the final ten or fifteen minutes promise of some great rewards only for the movie to pull the rug out from under us and leave us with nothing but frustration and 90 minutes of out lives wasted.
I’m sure they are saving all that for the sequel, which is at this point certain, after this honking log of shit somehow managed to ingest 36 million dollars of hard earned dollars from the accounts of countless movie goers this past weekend despite terrible notices and an ad campaign that looked more like a warning. I guess it proves my old theory that pure evil always works when it’s far more subtle. Why drive the audience completely fucking insane with something truly horrific and mind altering when you can simply bore them to the point of crying in uncontrollable sobs of pain and suffering for 10 bucks a head?
Hey there folks, Uncle Grumpyfuk cumin’ right atcha 10-4 good buddies! I just got back from the local Cub Scout Jamboree, teaching those juicy young lads the safe and correct basics of leathercrafting and knot tying – valuable life-skills we adults should feel obligated to teach the young,velvet-skinned leaders of tomorrow, and as David Carradine taught us, we don’t want any embarrassing little accidents happening,no sir Grasshopper! The boys were great, their minds (and bottoms,heh!) are just like sponges at that age, just ready to soak up anything you throw at or on them! Mercy!
Well folks today we’re going to review an arousing little piece of horrific splendor entitled “The Horrors of Spider Island” or “How the Swiss Family Robinson Should Have Gone!”.
We begin with a righteous set of wheels pulling up to a building and a well-dressed couple gets out,the tension makes “Henry Portrait of a Serial Killer” feel like “Mary Poppins”,shit! The bright sunny afternoon and open air add to the ominous pall that creeps into our souls and private parts. We quickly gather that ‘Gary’, a twinkle-toed Italian guy with impressive man-boobs, and Georgia, a woman with less than impressive woman-boobs are two agents contracted by Zepo Marx to secretly hire a troupe of transvestites for a dancing tour of Singapore to contract the deadly Unmellow-yellow Mono-gono-rhea and return home to infect the unsuspecting American public. I know,I know, I wish I’d thought of it too but we gotta give credit where credit’s due, sigh…
We’re introduced,one by one to the ‘girls’ and Uncle Grumpyfuk has to admit,they look and dance even better than Rupal on muscle relaxers so ships ahoy! we can easily envision some some happy ass Singapore sailors in the near future- eight eager trannies looking good enough to where a couple of bottles of Boonesfarm and some horse tranquilizers could make for an evening of serious potential blackmail material! ..heh!…ahem…aaanyway..
The group boards a small twin-prop airplane and after taking off and traveling a good ways over the Pacific it transforms into a much larger 4-prop bomber, pretty cool I must say. They suddenly begin to take flack from a small island below,the Japs who had diligently waited for the cursed Yanks since the war began in ’43. They were right on target and the bomber takes a nosedive into the drink,exploding like Justin Beiber’s cherry at a John Waters sleep-over, and all lives are lost. …except for our entire group of she-males, their manager and his assistant, who all managed to bail with a life-raft, landing in it one by one so that they all escaped possible death and a certain wetting.
Hair implants still in place they drift for days and days thousands of miles out to sea, even though there’s a rock sticking out of the water to the right. After some unruliness on the part of a dark shaggy brute that goes by the moniker ‘Linda’, Gary is forced to establish his dominant pimp-status and, as punishment, throws all of ‘Linda’s’ amil nitrates into the water,enjoying ‘her’ wails of despair. He then has to put his foot down again and set Jersey Joe, or ‘Babs’ straight after catching ‘her’ rubbing the mouth of the water bottle on ‘her’ crusty anus for laughs. Finally submission is achieved, gotta keep those man-bitches in line yes-siree!
After many days,drifting tens of thousands of miles out to sea one of the guys spots our movies’ namesake, Spider Island…well, actually there are two islands,they don’t tell us which one is Spider Island and they don’t tell us the name of the other island, and it will haunt me ’til my dying day,what was the name of the other island?! Sand Flea Island perhaps? An island inhabited by a mad scientist and his genetically mutated, radioactive sand fleas, as big as spaniels, who he loves as his own children! … I’ll never know.
When they reach the island the ‘girls’ begin to whine and carry on like typical queens and Gary is even forced to carry one of them ashore after discovering ‘she’d ‘ taken half a bottle of Nyquil. They collapse on the beach and after a spell Gary whips them into order and marches them off to explore the island. They moan and whimper until Gary spots a condominium in the distance,orfices quiver however upon entering they find an old bondage slave trussed up like Marilyn Manson at his 10th birthday party, however this old chili-dog knave was deader than a living carbon-based life form no longer imbued with life.
The trannies bolt as one, prancing about ,hamming it up to the umpteenth degree just like real women do,while Gary and Georgia, upon closer inspection deduce that the eunuch’s master had taken things a little too far (wink!) and his heart and left testicle had simultaneously exploded. Unfortunately the cabin reeked from the old slave’s bowels releasing and Gary forces the gagging yammering fudge packers to clean things up. They submit readily enough, quietly hoping for the murderous master’s return in anticipation of a fight with Gary for control of their leathery anal cavities, but no sign of any other people soon dampen their hopes.
After about 2 minutes a fight breaks out over someone’s mention of cellulite and those two blokes go at it like cats, woo-hoo!! I mean they even fight like women(!),slappin’ and rasslin’ about, pulling hair, damn if the ol’ pickle didn’t stiffen a tad! Gary breaks it up, showing once again who’s the boss and tells them they BOTH need to lose some weight! Ha! You ‘da man Gary!
Suffering from serious stress due to pharmaceutical withdrawal and lack of anal deposits has the group’s nerves on edge,and combined with the tropical heat they begin to disrobe. Now I gotta tell you, you’ve got to be impressed with the skills of plastic surgeons and reluctantly admire the dedication of these guys to starve themselves and keep so thin and feminine-like, the ol’ zipper is straining once again I gotta tell ya’! To add to the nuance, while this is going on some of the best soundtrack music of all time begins to play, that saxophone sounds like it’s spooging all over the front row of the audience by golly! I can’t wait ’til this comes out on cd!
Meanwhile Gary, exhausted from his busy pimp duties finds the condo owners Glock 9mm automatic,which he refers to as a revolver, ( hey, pimps don’t have to be smart just forceful right?) and takes off into the woods for a little walkabout. As he walks about he’s plagued with huge sand fleas ( yeah, uh-huh, right!)…and while he’s swatting at one on his temple, with his gun hand, he manages to decorate the surrounding foliage with small bits of skull fragments and brain matter, leaving our rugged manager a tad dazed and confused. He proceeds to wander off in search of zinc and Bob from Sesame Street, leaving the insecure girly-men alone to fend for themselves.
The next morning the guys put on their makeup, split up and search around fruitlessly (ha, get it?) for Gary who has meanwhile found his way back to the condo and unfortunately stumbles upon ‘Linda’ whom he gleefully forces to bob for river rocks, indefinitely! He then then spots Tiny Tim floating on the horizon, motioning him to come to him and wanders into the ocean never to be seen again until his next film.
The girls give up looking for Gary after a good 20 minutes of searching and after 3 more hours finally find the condo where they find the buoyant ‘Linda’ still bobbing for river rocks. They run in circles and shriek until they get tired and as they sit and continue to wail and carry on Georgia digs a deep grave in the rocky baked earth. Arnold or ‘Anne’ see his chance and stands at the edge of a cliff, totally faking it, until the others finally notice and ‘save’ him, fawning over him and carrying him back, fucking attention whore.
Unrest follows the leaderless group and soon Jersey Joe and Murray are at it like pro rasslin divas, and they may be guys but wow it’s more stimulating than a weeks’ worth of episodes of Romper Room! Then they see Gary’s hands come through the window as he tries to snatch a tampax but he disappears as quickly as he appears.
After a few sticky weeks a pair of Mary Kay reps motor up to the island and as soon as they unload their gear the older Moe heads down the path to the local hacienda to engage the occupants to the wonders of the Suckiu Vacuum Cleaner. As soon as his partner is out of sight the younger Bobby heads through the brush to the back of the compound and waits until Moe has the owners distracted. He then plans to sneak up behind the unsuspecting patriarch and finish him off with razor wire before he even suspects his adopted children will soon be orphans once more,for a short time anyway for then the pair plan to help themselves to the contents and occupants of the house for dining and sport (wink!). My kinda guys, eh folks?!? Yeah,ha-ha!
However just as Bobby begins to leave the boat he hears the unmistakable sound of men giggling and after climbing a slender tree trunk several times to get that ‘good feeling’ he climbs a larger tree overlooking the sunny lagoon and what do his horny eyes behold but several of our troupe of trannies splashing around in the shallows, washing the filth from their bodies and scouring the crusty scabs from their rank and pock-marked anuses with the fresh stinging salt water! Sha-wing!
Driven to near hornyological hysteria he sneaks down to the edge of the rocks where Gregory, or ‘Gladys’ has drifted away from the others. Bobby tazes him violently and while still spazzing like my neighbors cat in the bug zapper! …would probably look, you know, if it hit the bug zapper, heh…ahem, yes..anyway the other guys who only hear the commotion bolt like party-goers at Corey Haim’s most recent shindig leaving Bobby and a still twitching ‘Gladys’ alone to become acquainted with each others’ back sweat,(winky-wink!).
The guys all join up in the woods and the wetter ones begin to tell of ‘Gladys’ fate when they hear Moe coming down the trail singing that song, you know, that song …by that hot chick with the brown hair..YOU KNOW…that song!!! Shit! Anyway after capturing Moe and forcing him to lick Georgia’s still unwashed twazzer to prove he’s a friend they lead him towards the condo for humiliation games and s’mores! Bobby and a shaky ‘Gladys’ soon join the group and the party,she is on!
The guys dress up in their Singapore Island Whore hula-hoochee girl outfits and damn, the horse tranquilizers wouldn’t even be necessary! It’s a South Sea Sausage Fest, crabs for free, with raunchy saxophone lounge music and drunk swinin’ trannies, yee-haw!! Well Moe and Bobby spend the evening taking turns abusing the giggling choad worshipers purty mouths until Bobby is lured into the bush with a promise of candle waxing and crystal meth.
Unfortunately on his way to the lagoon Bobby falls to his knee- years of cheap cigarettes, rotgut island rum, stimulants, depresents and an addiction to monkey adrenal gland pancakes, courtesy of IHOP, have taken their toll and he lays projectile vomitting all of the precious alcohol and monkey glands he’d just consumed, and continues to do so until reduced to a withered corpse that bears a striking resemblance to a male Joan Rivers. Things are also not going so well back at the condo either.
After dining on lobster marinara the guys are sitting around comparing califlowers when Butcher McCree, or ‘Teena’ leaps to his feet and starts raving about fiddler crabs with Sharon Ozzborne faces and suddenly dashes out of the cabin,into the woods. The shocked group look at one another when they one by one begin to also feel a bit queasy and anti-gravitational.
Apparently the canned mushrooms that ‘Babs’ used in their meal were 2 weeks out of date and the hallucinatory effects were beginning to make themselves known…good deal!! Sadly ‘Teena’ wasn’t aware and the guys decide to try to find him before he hurts himself,it’s his turn to wash the dishes anyway! They light torches and join in pursuit of their addled member but are quickly distracted by the killer trailers produced by the torches they were all carrying. As they run in circles whirling the torches around and laughing, poor ‘Teena’ runs head on into some quicksand and hastens his demise attempting to dive for pearls. The guys laugh it up and head back to the condo,finishing the night out by tying up and buttfucking poor Moe. Then we see a ship sailing off.
The end.
Truly a great film, I was momentarily confused by the end credits,what with the womens’ names,then I thought about it, duh, stage names! Sorry folks,brain fart. Well I guess ol’ Grumpyfuk is going to jump online and check out hottrannies.com and see what there is to see! I’m used to them a bit younger,I do love my veal but we must always be open-minded and always try to experience and bugger new things in life! Ariba!
Take care folks, Uncle Grumpyfuck will be back atcha soon with another sharp and insightful critique of another golden piece of spider poop! I’m outta here!
In retrospect I guess the reason they called it Spider (singular )Island must have been because there was only one spider.
The Primal Root is back after a month off and to celebrate I am showcasing a piece of Trash Cinema featuring one of my all time favorite zombie femme fatales. That’s right, Ms. Julie Walker as brought to glorious undead life by the unfathomably gorgeous Melinda Clarke.
Get ready for a Special Guest Appearance from Ms. Jessica Critten (in her final appearance), grotesque body self mutilation, angry Latinos, tortured sewer dwelling do-gooders, half naked dancing zombies in chains and lederhosen, 2-4-5 Trioxin, dumb scientists, brain freeze bullets, teenagers listening to lite rock, necrophilia, terrible government security, brain munching and plenty of slimy, freakish canned zombies.
It’s a wild, bloody, stupid ride with Julie and Curt as they tamper in God’s domain and end up paying the price. It’s not quite Bride of Frankenstein…hell, it’s hardly Bride of the Monster. But Return of the Living Dead cracks me up every time and you cannot deny the appeal of a beautiful re-animated redheaded zombie girl with metal stuff shoved through her flesh.
Well, I think I’ve sufficiently creeped you all out enough. Enjoy the latest offering from yours truly, The Primal Root, and The Rotten Reviews.
Well, the long awaited second episode of Trash Cinema Collective presents The Primal root’s rotten Reviews is up and ready for viewing! This time around we’re tackling one of the strangest teensploitation, woman spurned, prostitution, hired killer, limp dick disco movies it has ever been my pleasure to watch.
Not a lot of blood in this one but there is a bit of nudity and some language. The latest video is not for the squeamish, as usual, but if you’ve come this far chances are you can handle this video. Use your good judgment.
I’m hoping to pump these videos out on a more regular basis so stay tuned! I have my next subject already lined up.
