Just Vamps 2024! 🧛🏻‍♀️

 

Retro Just Vamps 2024!

by Kristin Battestella

It's been awhile since I did some dedicated vampire viewing! Here's a trio of toothy throwbacks varying in their vampire success.

Pale Blood – It's 1990 and our thoroughly modern vampire traveling with a fold-out portable coffin hires a Los Angeles detective agency to solve a series of gruesome copycat crimes in this Hong Kong direct to video production that shows it's age with a flat print, poor sound, and far too many hustle and bustle traffic transitions. Voiceovers that won't make sense until the end, airport minutia, anonymous driving, logistical exposition, and then more driving make for a very slow start. Punk music at the club is edgy with tense, electronic seedy to set the mood, but the music montage vignettes serve no purpose – save for a nonchalant Sybil Danning (The Howling II) as a blink and you miss her pedestrian. Berets, brooches, boxy coats, vintage cars, and a mod vampire condo provide cool nostalgia while blue nighttime lighting, red spotlights, and neon signs pepper steamy scenes. Sensationalist news crews report on the dead body at the boutique, but our ingenue detective has Nosferatu clips and knows all the vampire lore. The clever deduction is well done with debates on the puncture marks and questions why a vampire wouldn't just take enough blood rather than unnecessarily kill. Where does the blood go if he's not drinking it? What do you do if the killer is a vampire and you actually catch him? Our cruising vampire needs no pick up lines – getting right to the strobe in the bedroom, colorful pink titillation, bitten boobs, and overhead revelry. Shadows and silhouettes accent violent flashes of the bloody crimes as the splatter and psychic visions escalate. Everyone in the club watching who might be the vampire when they each have a different piece of the puzzle creates tension. The enthralled dame loves his hypnotic eyes, but he doesn't want her to fall in love with him and uses an eerie echoing voice to make her forget him. However, our photographer repeatedly demands his models touch an egg during a suggestive shoot, luring hookers who need the money into sessions they don't want to do. Toxic masculinity abounds as the women are bitten, manhandled, and harassed before being strapped to the table with bloody tubes, sinks, and drains. Locked up vampires able to poof out and levitate make little sense before a one on one fight hampered by obvious cut corners filming. The style grows stagnant in last half hour with dated cheapness, and the silly twists run out of steam. Fortunately, the revelations are surprisingly smart with a bemusing finale comeuppance. This is an entertaining midnight movie – for the erroneous hokey as well as for the ambiance it gets right.

The Reflecting Skin – Viggo Mortensen contends with a would-be vampire in rural 1950s America for this 1990 British/Canadian co-production from writer and director Philip Ridley (also of The Passion of Darkly Noon with Mortensen). However the lovely golden fields and patriotic flag waving aren't what they seem thanks to the bittersweet score, youths tormenting frogs, and bloody pranks against kooky widow Lindsay Duncan (Rome). Unique, innocent names like Dolphin Blue and Seth Dove contrast debates on killing reptiles and if the dead are angels in heaven or in a coffin being eaten by worms. Seth's father reads a book about vampires that suck the life out of you while his mother obsessively cleans in hope that soldier son Viggo's return will make their downtrodden life better. She also makes Seth drink too much water until he pees his pants, and metaphors about drinking blood, dehydration, and thirst accent the creepy farmhouse with old whaling artifacts. It's actually funny how our imaginative boy with nothing to do jumps to the conclusion that the widow is a vampire. She gives Seth a freaky old harpoon and recounts how her husband hung himself and took all the sunshine out of her life. Of course, from a child's perspective, grief making a woman feel 200 years old is taken literally rather than as sad and lonely. When another youth goes missing, the hysterical blame scapegoats and social outcasts as the repressed isolation is passed between weird twins and screaming kids. The cartoonish sheriff advertises our dad's gay encounters because surely he must be the pervert responsible for the dead body in the well, and mom slaps her husband around for having to live down his gossip. Serving was the only way for Viggo's Cameron to get away from the fiery destruction and shrewdly layered symbolism on the repression about to burst, and he doesn't appear until forty minutes into the film. Their home is ugly and smaller now and he admonishes young Seth that he is not a hero thanks to his guilt over the atom bomb. Upon discovering a calcified dead fetus, Seth talks to it and keeps it under his bed like a doll. It's both silly and worrisome when he makes a cross and spies on his brother, not understanding the sadness at the cemetery nor his intrusion upon Cameron's flirting with Dolphin. Seth's lack of comprehension grows while his empathy diminishes; he mistakes Cameron's radiation symptoms as the vampire's doing when the naked man lies as the babe in her arms. Disturbing abductions and lies happen in the picturesque daylight, and there's no one to blame but ourselves once mentally unstable youth become little monsters filled with secrets and sin. Once his brother intends to leave with his lady love, Seth won't be left behind with his dead baby doll. He makes a demented choice to perpetuate violence as the sun sets on his innocence. Obviously this is not a true horror piece, however this dark social commentary still speaks on today's horrors of war that we pretend don't exist. This is an excellent, ahead of its time vampire as mirror to nature metaphor analyzing fear and fanatics. One bereaved mother asks what's killing our children but we are – and that's the real horror.

Skip Unless You Want to Laugh

Dracula's Guest – This low budget 2008 direct-to-video production is very loosely based on Bram Stoker's titular short story, and the amateur acting and bad accents compound the overly wordy, trying to sound ye old script. The in media res opening also has Elizabeth Murray telling her betrothed Bram Stoker that Dracula has raped her with the seed of his beast, giving away the violence, death, and family secrets before going back six months earlier for time-wasting fencing and BFF sparring. Coastal photography, spooky crescendos, and tolling bells herald Dracula's realty request for a rental with high walls and no windows. However his constant scowl is... a choice...., and the men bending over backward for his commission are humorous alongside proper Victorian fathers tut tutting at an arm around the shoulder as practically fornicating in public. Admiral Murray demands Elizabeth and Bram wait a year to marry, so she runs away to be captured by Dracula. The talking back dialogue is too modern yet naive, and cutting away from danger for men talking about what they are going to do about it again wastes time whilst also hampering any attempt at patriarchal commentary. Simple sets, low budget necessities, and minimal effects are fine; but it's a disjointed hop, nonsensical skip, and instantaneous jump to Transylvania as convenient. Rather than staying with the candlelight menace, we cut away again to lovelorn Bram taking scenic strolls when his hackney old landlady does her best Una O'Connor impression. Such unnecessary elements short change the story with unintentional laughter on top of the erroneous attempt to make the rapaciousness romantic as if this were Meatloaf's “I Would Do Anything for Love.” Despite being in a dungeon with only a mattress and her corset, Elizabeth never realizes her peril. She cries out for Bram – who's being chased by French peasants through Germany on Walpurgisnacht – and that's actually the only segment from the Stoker source. Unfortunately, the poor pacing, weak writing, and character stupidity play like a parody of Billy Crystal and Carol Kane in The Princess Bride. The entire opening scene repeats in the final twenty minutes, and despite some attempted eerie sequences, there are no really scary scenes. Action hero Bram dangles on the castle ledge, putting up his fists and vowing to defeat Dracula with his Notre Dame logo looking self before the Admiral's sword fight with Dracula makes room for a bad quip between every thrust and parry. Our Big Man Vampire is easily defeated with little point to Elizabeth being pregnant and immortal with her own supposed magical abilities. If this wasn't going to be a self-aware comedy, then it should have stuck more faithfully to Stoker's story. Although this isn't a waste of time if you can laugh, it can't be taken seriously, either.

Dead, Deader, Deadest Horror

Dead, Deader, Deadest!

by Kristin Battestella

These fatal films and documentaries offer a wealth of gruesome, gore, blood, and body counts to match their ghastly names.

The Black Death: The World's Most Devastating Plague – Purdue Medieval Literature Professor Dorsey Armstrong hosts this 2016 twenty-four episode lecture series from The Great Courses Signature Channel, beginning with early feudal nobles versus peasants, religious society and church control, and urban growth in the medieval warm period before a changed Europe in 1348 with plague reducing the population from 150 million to 70 million. Onscreen maps, notations, and timelines supplement the disturbing first hand accounts, despairing eye witness testimonies, and Old English translations of outbreak terrors – focusing on the human response to pestilence while dispelling misnomers on The Black Death's name and symptoms. Some victims writhed in long suffering agony while others died within a day, drowning in their own blood thanks to bubonic, septicemic, and pneumonic bacterium. Ebola virus comparisons are specific and gruesome alongside scientific theories on bacillus causes, tuberculosis similarities, Blue Sickness inconsistencies, and Anthrax possibilities. Prior Justinian outbreaks, Asian beginnings in Kaffa, and Italian trade route migration spread plague while fleas, rats, and gerbils transmission, weather patterns, and even extraterrestrial origins are debated. Entire villages were ravaged with hemorrhagic fever contributing to the scourge's spread on poor, crowded, malnourished people fearing the judgment of god, wearing creepy masks, and carrying fragrant herbs to curb the smell of mass shallow graves and dog-mauled bodies. Despite illiteracy, wills and documentation accumulate – although journals have blank spaces and abrupt ends because the writers died. Vacancies increase while religious orders decrease since those ministering to the sick die, yet crime declines as thieves won't even enter a wealthy but plagued home. Avignon pilgrimages bring devastation and Walking Dead comparisons as Florence's valuable textiles are burned. Prostitutes are often cast out – not for transmission worries, but to purge sin from a city. Orphans and widows become dependent on the patriarchal society, and artistic guild become charitable necessities. Flagellant movements fill the religious gap while England's unexposed island population leaves London with no place left to put the dead. When only the 103 heads of households are marked dead in the census, one can conservatively deduce the number of dead was probably quadruple that 103. In a town of 1,000, what if the average household number was seven? Ghost ships arrive in Norway, and grim reaper folklore expresses Scandinavian fears amid whispers of children being buried alive to appease angry gods. Primitive remedies and blood letting rise, as do tales of monks and nuns going out in style with debauchery and hedonism or gasp, dancing in town wide festivals. An entire episode is dedicated to antisemitism and Jewish persecutions, a depressing and violent response on top of the plague, and the callous church using the pestilence as an opportunity to remind people it was their sinful fault may have helped spur later reformations. Of course, lack of clergy meant the church accepted anyone for ordination, leaving priests who didn't know what they were doing when the faithful public needed help most. Outside of nobles losing their privileged status, most classes were ironically better off post-plague with memento mori artwork and danse macabre murals flourishing amid literary masterpieces and dramatic analysis inspiring the early renaissance and the likes of Chaucer. Economic booms re-establish trade as the aristocracy marries into the merchant class and peasants revolt for more power, changing the world for centuries to come. While lengthy for the classroom itself, these half hours are jammed packed with information, documentation, and statistics keeping viewers curious to learn more. This is a fine accompaniment or a la carte for independent study – an academic approach rather than the in your face, sensationalized documentary formats permeating television today. The Great Courses Channel is worth the streaming add-on for a variety of informative videos, and this macabre selection is perfect for fans of horror history.

Daughter of Death – Anthony Franciosa (Tenebre) and Sybil Danning (Howling II) star alongside the titular Isabelle Mejias (Scanners II) in this 1983 international production also known as Julie Darling. Certainly the print is flat with a slightly distorted ratio, rough outdoor scenery, poor highway scenes, and dark action that's tough to see. Fortunately, vintage Spanish Gothic homes and nostalgic shag hair, instant coffee, pay phones, talk of the roller rink, and malls add to the family conflicts and slithering snakes let loose. Julie is clearly a daddy's girl, but mom thinks boarding school will straighten out her budding anti-social behavior – she scares a school friend and insists she would rather go hunting with her dad than date boys or even marry. While her affection seems innocent to start, Julie is too young to be tucked in at night yet not old enough to see doctor dad operate at the hospital. The delivery guy checks out her mom and we see the Mrs. in a steamy bath, but the budding Electra sociopathy fully emerges once an opportunistic attack makes the choice between screaming mother and daughter with a rifle. Frenetic classical music on the headphones matches the rough assault before the edgy, synth score accents the chilling decision, subsequent lies, and plays for daddy's sympathy. Julie cuts mom out of all their pictures, too. Of course, Julie doesn't know the real reason her parents were fighting, namely her soon to be stepmother who brings along a little brother. Dad takes to the boy, replacing Julie in both the young lady and favorite child departments when they were supposed to have the house all to themselves. She hears the moaning of course, peaking in on the saucy, slightly raw sex scenes – escalating the creepy as Julie imagines herself in her stepmother's place. Does she even realize the sexual aspects or that there are different types of love for each of them? This is an interesting mental study that correctly strays the fine line between the sinister suspense and surprising horror. It isn't about gore a minute, but the twisted dread as viewers wonder when the hide and seek games will turn to terror. Our stepmom sees the competition and will protect her new husband and young son amid chess parallels, ladder dangers, and murderous matricide calculations.

A Split Decision

Dead of Winter – Lovely snow tipped trees, mountains, and chilly rivers begat hiking perils, rock tumbles, ropes cut, snowy crashes, and hungry wolves in this 2014 Canadian geocaching terror. Of course, there are bus driving montages, DUI histories, annoying music, getting gas in middle of nowhere clichés, and ridiculously hammy dialogue like “Is your cock ever soft?” “Only in your mommy!” WTF. One jerk films everybody in a camcorder point of view even as they clearly all have chips on their shoulders, but the sardonic documentation is forgotten as we quickly meet the cliché, overly excited nerds, angry lesbians, and the dude bros who want to watch amid nighttime scenery, windshield wipers, and the increasingly icy road. Although people are bundled up for this snowy treasure hunt, their faces are still Hollywood exposed as the teams run to and fro in the woods following creepy clues in a kind of humorous montage before no phone signals, a bus that won't start, garroting logger cables, and explosions. If they're stranded two hundred miles and at least four days walk from anywhere, why doesn't anyone stay near the fiery bus for heat and signal fires? Everyone continues following the increasingly bizarre geocache reveals such as a gun with no bullets and a stop watch promising screams in ninety seconds despite falling snow showers, waterfalls, and damaged bridges. One dumb ass know it all thinks a creaking old wood bridge with over a foot of snow on top the buckling boards is safe so they all go for it because he says there's a quarry shortcut and a convenient cabin nearby, too. Somebody has to take a dump in the snow, it's obvious who's going to die next – cough one lesbian and the black guy cough – and the hip acting hampers the finger pointing group divisions. Thanks to the straightforward rather than herky jerky filming, we can see the bloody hangings, torn limbs, and splatter gore, but arrows and crossfire reveal the killer far too soon when a movie about a treasure hunt shouldn't give up its reward until the end. Head scratching cutaways, airplane rescue fake outs, and whining about missing pizza further break audience immersion as no one complains about blisters, cold, or frostbite on their gloveless hands. No one is tired – least of all the driver who drove all night and then drank all day who says he'll stay up on watch while the others sleep. They didn't follow the river but are later glad to have handy flashlights and booze to drink as they joke about eating the tubby jerk first rather than addressing any real cannibalism horror. Jealously, one person that is not so mysteriously absent, a knife plus a pen and suddenly anybody can do an instant tracheotomy – it takes an hour for someone to realize this was planned revenge thanks to some prior competition because geocaching is a mad competitive and dangerous sport! The riddles and underground hideouts run out of steam with sagging contrivances and overlong, predictable explanations. This is watchable with entertaining horror moments, however the cliché points and outlandish but wait there's more on and on will become too laughable for some. Our survivors may have beaten the horror hunt, but everyone apparently forgets they're still stranded in the wilderness before the fade to black. Oops.

British Thrillers and Tales

British Thrills, Chills, and Horror Tales

by Kristin Battestella

Let's travel across the pond and back a decade or two for these British crimes, English folktales, night terrors, and cult fears. Pip pip!

Bluebeard – Aerial accolades, colorful balls, and a lavish mansion aren't enough for Welsh titan Richard Burton as he creatively works his way through Sybil Danning (Chained Heat), Raquel Welch (One Million Years B.C.), and more dames in this 1972 retelling. Dark room red lighting, old time photography, ink blot artwork, and portraits of the dead add a sinister sense of sophistication as wartime flashbacks and flight disasters explain the flashy facial hair. Unfortunately, tense hunting accidents are too realistic in their animal killings, putting a damper on the well shot action alongside a confusing setting with Nazis talking Aryan beauty, World War I inserts, and a mod mood that feels too sixties. Saucy lace and classy nude women keep every frame pretty, however the famous ladies are dubbed, barely named or developed, and naturally come and go quickly save for singer Joey Heatherton in the first hour. A photograph of each Mrs. with her name and date would have helped heaps in documenting the fatalities rather than haphazard trips down memory lane dragging the middle and stalling the forward discovery. The uneven, meandering focus between the psychosis and a current escape undercuts the audience's emotional attachment – no guillotine pun intended. Burton is having a great time, but we never really get inside the killer's mind thanks to a superficial, lighthearted tone glossing over the potential sexual impetus or mother/son suggestions. Impotence jokes interfere with the women hatred and warped lust deserves death theories, and the prostitute girl-on-girl practicing isn't as tantalizing as it should be – just inadvertently humorous like the score. Dusty suits of armor, wine vats, mysterious keys, secret cameras, and electric chairs do much better in hitting home the peril amid cobwebbed passages, secret spiral stairs, and gruesome taxidermy everywhere. Perhaps the thin points of the original tale are at fault, but this account relies more on the viewer knowing fun deaths are afoot and enjoying the merry-go-round instead of embellishing the story all the way. Despite lacking polish and being a bit too tame, there are fortunately some delightful performances to be had here – especially Welch as a hot nun who seriously got around before the habit.

Fear in the Night – Writer and director Jimmy Sangster (Lust for a Vampire) opens this 1972 Hammer creepy with playgrounds, children singing hymns, and sweet Tudor mansion turned school locales. Judy Geeson's (Mad About You) 22-year-old Peggy should find such quaint idyllic well and jolly good when she moves to the school's cute cottage with her new husband Ralph Bates (Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde). Unfortunately, bathroom break ins, masked attacks, prosthetic arms, and others claiming the intruder wasn't there add mentally unstable doubts alongside prior hospital stays and chats with an unseen therapist. This out of term school is empty – covered furniture, set tables with no one there, little beds waiting – not to mention the creepy sculptures and isolated uncertainty. The viewer is invested in the characters thanks to such underlying suspicious, Latin classroom whispers, and charming but surely up to no good headmaster Peter Cushing. His innocent gentlemanly teacher facade quickly becomes old school imposing with “Do an old man a favor” innuendo when Peggy sits in a child size desk while he compliments her. The audience sees clues she doesn't, but we are also cut away from other attack details, adding to the non-believer questioning. Likewise, pre-Alexis Joan Collins is simply too stern, self-assured, and beautiful to be the little old headmaster's wife. Rabbit hunting, loaded guns, home alone at night fears, and scary noises about the house just don't add up, and although slightly sloppy, the intercut sessions with the therapist askew the timeline, creating more unreliability on what has happened. Interspersed awkward meetings and slow burn tensions are somewhat uneven as well, lowering scenes into a lull before false happiness and then topping the act off with a scare, however the rural setting allows for both large scale frights and smaller, intimate interior terrors. Individual sequences are well shot with tense shadows, staircases, echoes, and odd behaviors accenting the unexplained action, trauma, and twists. Shrewd viewers will peg some of the gaslighting obviousness and psychological games at work and there is a certain dull lack of Hammer panache at times, but the cast and final pursuits give this one an entertaining finish.

The Lair of the White Worm – Sleek Amanda Donahue (L.A. Law), posh prick Hugh Grant (Bridget Jones' Diary), the obviously dubbed princess Catherine Oxenberg (Dynasty), and scientist Peter Capaldi (Doctor Who) star in this 1988 Ken Russell (Lady Chatterley) vampire comedy drawing from Bram Stoker and earlier English tales. Granted, there are no subtitles, making the assorted dialects or cheeky banter tough for some. Folk rock stylings combined with neon and line dances are out of date, too, however the music does provide critical pieces on the eponymous legend. The horror gross buffet winks on English cuisine – setting the quaint country mood alongside a deputy who can't come to the scene because the chief has taken their one car and the lone taxi driver is locked up for drinking. Alas, backyard archaeology uncovers giant, inexplicable fossils amid Roman foundations – leading to vanished parents, cavern evidence, and spelunking for dragon-like earthworms. Ominous short cuts culminate in garter belts, black lingerie, thigh high boots, and steamy baths from one suave ladyship neighbor. The trouser snake and one-eyed monster meets vampire penetrations provide eighties wit and sexy yet absurd self-awareness while nudity and girly temptations accent the creepy paintings and stewardess dream sequences. Fiery flashbacks with nuns, crucifixion, nasty worms, and rapacious Romans look effects poor, yet the bizarre and scary visuals remain effective. Christian versus pagan virgins and scarifies call out both schools as warped angles, hypnotic camera zooms, and well shot frames capture the background crucifix or the monstrous altar in front. Victim paralysis, hissing, lengthy fangs, and spitting venom create a unique reptile design matching the snakes and ladders symbolism and heavy rituals interrupted by the gosh darn bloody doorbell. Although this has a very British, over the top cheerio tone, that bemusing pip pip bungling at times impedes the heroes. It's not scary and snake charmer musical moments are laughable today – but those bagpipes do come in handy! Evil manor surprises result in an intense monster ritual finale complete with green effects, blue body paint, snake gods, visions of bloody bodies on spikes, and a bonus scary looking strap-on giant pointy dildo thing...ouch.

Nothing but the Night – Lovely seaside waves escalate toward explosive cliffside accidents and townhouse suicides in this 1973 ninety minute thriller full of fun seventies interiors and retro British stylings. Funky patterns and zany lamps catch the eye while cool cars, phone booths, tape recorders, old science equipment, teletype machines, and printouts accent the rowdy school bus, suspicious orphanage, and hospital experiments. Meddling newspaper reporters uncover mysterious trust organizations with cult connections, and scholarly doctor Peter Cushing and personally invested police colonel Christopher Lee work together as membership fatalities, red tape, politicking, and aristocratic histories impede the case –leaving a traumatized young girl in the balance. Yes, oft onscreen rivals or villains Big Pete and Our Man Christopher are good guys (!) on the same side (!!) unraveling past traumas and fiery experiences with hypnosis and tender child moments as they battle against a prostitute mother and shady trustees. Both the doctors and the law are trying to do what's right, and Georgia Brown (The Raging Moon) holds her own against misogyny, little woman in the workplace tensions, and some mixing business with pleasure. Fedoras, spotlights, and silhouettes also invoke a noir mood over the seemingly straightforward corruption – initially there really isn't much horror or sinister to the procedural and press conferences. However, freaky deaths, fine child performances, and possibly supernatural twists soon imply something is not right about this island orphanage beyond the converging crimes. Some viewers may find the plot basic with too many layered possibilities lacking a cohesive finesse, and perhaps this should have decided on being all spooky or only straight crime rather than tacking on science and brain talk versus paranormal connections. I also wish Lee's Charlemagne production company had done more films, but the cast, period investigation, increasingly creative kills, and ritual murders do hit home the occult history with shocks, surprises, bonfires, and a crazy good Guy Fawkes finale.

King Arthur and More Fantasy!

An Arthurian and Fanciful Trio!

By Kristin Battestella

Yes, I'm still waiting for a definitive Camelot film. Fortunately, be it Arthurian high notes or medieval fantasy and more magical swashbucklers, there's fanciful fun for one and all with this trio of enchanting, classic tales.

Camelot – Richard Harris (The Field), Vanessa Redgrave (Mary Queen of Scots), and Franco Nero (Django) star in this 1967 adaptation of the Lerner and Lowe stage musical complete with rousing overtures, smokey battle soliloquies, a de-aging backwards Merlin, and charming fairytale adventure. Sure, the cardboard looking trees and plastic snow are dated, but the award winning design, sixties hairstyles, and hippie-esque costumes somehow remain fittingly ye olde. Horses, castles, and medieval interiors add flair amid dancing spectaculars and a small but bemusing cast. They are having a good time, and why not? The sing song talking, full blown chorales, and uneven vocals make everything seem a lot more fun than the actual 5^th century England really was, but that over the top lightheartedness and self aware humor matches the fanciful. The “C'est Moi” introduction ridiculously captures Lancelot's full of himself righteousness, and nostalgic adults can catch the innuendo of “The Lusty Month of May” while young audiences enjoy the innocent fun – an aria for the concept of a round table! Three hours can occupy kids for sure, but the singing exposition and disjointed storytelling can irritate older viewers without a childhood affinity for this tale both serious and Robin Hood: Men in Tights in its overlong indulgence, unbalanced direction, and weak ending. This sweeping storybook stage style doesn't always play well onscreen and the musical entrapment is ultimately unnecessary, leaving the dramatic moments as the best here. Though the jovial is more important than interweaving a complete Arthurian recounting, the once sunny and snow white symbolism turns visually darker as the politics escalate inevitably. Despite the musical imperfections, young and old can enjoy the highlights here with sword in the stone fondness, knights of the round table drama, and meddling Mordred conflicts.

Crossed Swords – This two hour 1978 swashbuckler based on Mark Twain 16^th century switcharoo boasts an all-star cast including Charlton Heston, Raquel Welsh, Oliver Reed, George C. Scott, Ernest Borgnine, Sybil Danning, and Rex Harrison. Stirring Maurice Jarr scoring accents the chases, sword fights, fun faire peasantry, and quaint village while the colorful court and sweet ladies frocks add period fancy. Despite historical names like Edward, Henry VIII, and Norfolk, the coming and going cameos anchor the youth-centric lookalike fantasy, over the top whimsical, and sardonic flavor befitting of the novel's social lessons. Brief split screen effects blend seamlessly, carrying the uneven design, which looks elaborate in some scenes and cheap in others. Mark Lester's acting isn't perfect, either – he's stuck still playing a child's role and comes off as a simpleton whether he is the prince or the pauper. Shouldn't one or the other be shrewd or charismatic? Ironically, that lacking in grace fits both the street urchin with no upbringing and the coddled royal. Had Lester done this ten years prior following Oliver! his performance would have been perfect. Yes, liberties are taken here and the pace between its subjects drags. However, it is surprising this did poorly when today every intellectual property is unabashedly twisted into a big money American teen absurdity. Producer Ilya Salkind is clearly capitalizing on his Musketeer success with this literary adventure for kids complete with the same adult stars. Modern parents may find the overlong time tough to take seriously despite mature moments and a wild finish – but this isn't meant to be a sophisticated drama. This is The Parent Trap for boys wrapped up in a medieval ball of fun. I mean, the jester is in red and green harlequin with bells, go with it. 

 

Excalibur – Although I still need a Lord of the Rings caliber Arthur, this 1981 epic swelling with the Lady of the Lake, the Sword in the Stone, and the Holy Grail came out of a failed Tolkien adaptation. Go figure. Fiery orange and hellish battles accent the divine forests, waterfalls, and Irish locations. However the dark and looking low budget design is of its time with confusing action and corny jousting. Glowing reflections on the shiny armor, red lighting, and a green sheen upon the swords feel lightsaber influenced, but the medieval costumes, mystical fog, and colorful interiors lift the mature yet fanciful. While extended nudity and Arthur's birth may add that extra twenty on the two hour and twenty minute length, the often skipped Uther and Igrayne trickery is frankly addressed – even if it is director John Boorman's (Deliverance) daughter Katrine playing Igrayne. Awkward! Rousing and familiar classical music anchors the magical moments, but the otherwise limp scoring contributes to a clunky middle. This isn't as timeless or fantastic as it should be despite a generally complete script combining Mallory and other Arthurian sources for a linear birth, life, and death retelling. Lots of now big names are here, too – including Gabriel Byrne, Patrick Stewart, and Liam Neeson – however Nigel Terry's (Caravaggio) clipped delivery and over the top stage style is an odd choice for Arthur. Mumbling dialogue and fancy names make subtitles a must, but Nicol Williamson (The Seven-Per-Cent Solution) is a fun sage as Merlin while Helen Mirren as Morgana is an alluring villainess. Ironically, her antagonism is better than the core love triangle and a meh Nicholas Clay (Lady Chatterley's Lover) as Lancelot. This is firmly a fantasy not going for historical accuracy, yet the gritty and adult tone paints a not so pretty picture of mysticism versus religion, self versus duty, and messianic reflections upon mistakes befitting of the legend. It takes several watches and one has to be in the right mood for the duration, but the not always magical and mature drama captures the moral of the tale.

Full Eclipse and Howling II

Bad, Bad Dog: Full Eclipse and Howling II: Your Sister is A Werewolf

By Kristin Battestella

Somehow, I managed to stumble upon not one, but two questionable tales of wolfdom- the 1985 sequel Howling II: Your Sister is a Werewolf and the 1993 HBO original movie Full Eclipse.  Ruh-roh!

LA detective Max Dire (Mario Van Peebles) loses his wife and his partner and can’t quite deal.  Fortunately, new special officer Adam Garou (Bruce Payne) invites Max to join his exclusive criminal task force- composed of other quality, but struggling cops like Casey Spencer (Patsy Kensit) who take the law into their own hands.  The team injects themselves with a special serum designed by Garou, giving them superior prowess against the crime on the street…and a few werewolf tendencies.

Director Anthony Hickox (Waxwork) and writers Michael Reaves (Gargoyles, Smurfs) and Richard Christian Matheson’s (The A-Team, and yes, son of Richard Matheson) standard, undeveloped cop story has its share of script issues as it weakly deals with all the typical detective traumas like alcohol, empty marriages, and corruption.  More repeating clichés and meandering plots waste far too much time for a 90-minute movie. Worse still, Full Eclipse never decides whether it’s a cop movie or a horror film- this wolf unit is supposed to be so total justice and badass, but the entire idea is just too preposterous even for fantasy.  The dark realism attempt comes across as totally hokey, and a lot of the poor design work is too dark and tough to see anyway.  Though dated by the nineties fashions, the lingering low budget feelings and mismashed plots are worse than any of the old motifs.  ‘Looks old’ you can forgive if the tale holds up, but this nineties badass isn’t really that badass at all thanks to too much useless, bad action and slow motion police work.  And all this is before all the cheesy werewolf mess! There’s simply not enough mystery or scares to accept the crappy effects, wolverine like wolf claws, and cops suited up like cannibal superheroes.

Fans of Mario Van Peebles, thankfully, can find a few things to enjoy in Full Eclipse. Granted, Peebles (Damages, All My Children, New Jack City, Heartbreak Ridge, Posse, Solo, I’ll stop) is kind of just being himself as always, but it’s juicy, cocky, and fun to watch as expected. Likewise, Bruce Payne (Highlander: Endgame) is freaky fun.  The script and goofy wolf serum plot don’t serve him well, but some might enjoy his violent creepy, disturbing as that it is.  Unfortunately, it’s Patsy Kensit (Emmerdale, Lethal Weapon 2, music chick and rocker wife) who drops the ball most in Full Eclipse. Yes, there’s plenty of nineties rowdy English rose pretty, but she’s also pretty obvious and absolutely unbelievable as a cop- much less an action hero with hairy secrets or a meaty attitude.  Actually, there’s no chemistry among the cast, and Full Eclipse isn’t nearly as sexy as it could have been.  And that ‘love scene’ between Kensit and MVP is just pathetic.  I’ve never seen people bump and grind whilst being so far away from each other! 

Likewise, fans of that horror titan himself, Christopher Lee, can attempt the badly bizarre novelty of Howling II: Your Sister is a Werewolf.  But of course, Sir Christopher’s voice is great as always- and I do so love the way he insistently repeats that subtitle! He certainly looks the classy werewolf hunter, or excuse me, the ‘occult investigator’.   Big C always comes to play even in a bad, bad movie such as this, but the classy older Lee going for those funky white sunglasses and red leather jacket for some undercover eighties clubbing is just….no.  In some scenes, it’s like there’s Christopher Lee, and then there’s everyone else- and to top it off, he has the Holy Grail in his wolf arsenal. I kid you not. Lee’s Occult expert Stefan must convince reporter Jenny (Annie McEnroe) and Ben White (Reb Brown, Captain America) that his sister- the reporter Karen White from the 1981 film The Howling- is now a werewolf needing to be staked in her crypt.  To stop all the virile werewolves from rising with the full moon, the trio must travel to Transylvania and destroy the ancient wolf queen Stirba (Sybil Danning) before she makes hairy werewolf love in a spectacular eighties light show. I repeat, I kid you not.

Truly, this cast is so, so bad (I made a mistake when I typed my notes and wrote ‘sos’ bad, as in ‘S.O.S’, wow!) Annie McEnroe (Beetlejuice) is a totally unrealistic and mousy reporter with pathetic delivery.  In her scenes with Lee, it feels like he would have been better off talking to a wall because it is that one-sided of a conversation.  None of it sounds right, especially the bad howling during the weird wolf sex. While I love the idea of a sexy and badass black wolf chick stealing the show, Marsha Hunt (Dracula A.D. 1972) isn’t given the proper treatment.  Her makeup and over the top wolf plots are too eighties to be sexy, and the full doggy getup ends up looking more like a drag queen.  It’s an utter injustice for what could have been hot hot hot. Thankfully, Sybil Danning (Amazon Women on the Moon) is totally fetching despite that scary and violent leather bodysuit. The incredibly weak script gives her nothing to say but growls and gibberish- was that aged 10 millennia did you say, really? Danning looks perfectly perky and kinky in her prime, but if only we could have seen more of her and Lee together in something more Hammer juicy. Alas, instead we get the very disturbing Little Person Werewolf Hunter Jiri Krytinar (Amadeus), who unfortunately gets his brain imploded by Stirba before turning Don’t Look Now. Ouch.  

This utterly preposterous story from director Phillippe Mora (A Breed Apart) twists source novelist Gary Brandner’s mythos and also goes by Howling II: Stirba- Werewolf Bitch.  Well, I may as well stop reviewing right there, for there isn’t anything major wolfy or bitchy here. This 1985 sequel is a far cry from its cult treat predecessor, with nasty werewolf implications that don’t go far enough and awkward, reaching ties to the original film. Too many changes to the werewolf essentials almost turn Howling II into a vampire move. These Transylvania wolves are immune to silver and can only be stopped by titanium stakes through the heart.   Every eighties horror shtick possible is used – fire magic wolves get their powers binded by Big Christopher in what is a completely random and unfulfilling attempt at sexy horror and wolf comedy.  Everything about Howling II is mistaken, from the bad, unnecessary eighties music over taking everything to the low of the lowest budget 1985 design.  The punk teen Euro wolfy fashions, horrible lycan effects, awful zooms, and disastrous attempts at what you don’t see horror- really; these werewolves toss crates to ensnare their victims! Likewise, they themselves are caught in some bad action scenes and get captured with fishing nets!  

I’m harsh, yes, but Howling II: Your Sister is a Werewolf and Full Eclipse can be entertaining believe it or not- if you really, really like bad wolfy movies or are seriously jonesing over the leading men. It’s ironic because Mario Van Peebles and Christopher Lee are probably as far from each other in the leading man spectrum as you could get, but both deserve to be in a quality wolf horror movie. Nonetheless, their fans can still have fun here. However, if you are a highbrow fright connoisseur and expect some sense of credibility or logic in your lycan films, then move along doggie.

Halloween (2007)

New Halloween Not for Everyone
By Kristin Battestella

I’ve been mulling over my thoughts on Rob Zombie’s new Halloween remake for days. After finally taking in the horror update at the matinee, my feelings remain mixed. This version of Halloween is not for everyone.

A host of familiar faces appear for musician turned director Zombie’s fourth feature film. Zombie’s wife Sherrie Moon stars as Deborah Myers, a stripper struggling with a drunkard abusive man, slutty teen daughter, and young son Michael-who likes to torture small animals. After one too many taunts and insults, masked Mike kills the school bully and murders his family on Halloween. Psychologist Samuel Loomis (Malcolm McDowell) works with Mike Myers at a mental institution, but when he breaks free 15 years later, its up to Loomis to stop Mike from repeating his Halloween rampage- and finding his now grown baby sister Laurie (Scout-Taylor Compton).

Zombie’s remake both rises and falls on the actors involved. Moon is perfect as the do gooder stripper mom, and young Mike Myers actor Daeg Faerch is also stunning. His silent looks and creepy eyes sell the sociopathy of young Mike. The strength of the film is in its extended opening sequences. Unlike John Carpenter’s original 1978 Halloween, we have the time to explore what makes Mike do what he does, how it effects his mother and others around him.

I would have preferred the movie stay this way, but unfortunately we jump to teenage Laurie and her friends dying in gruesome, sexy ways. These boys and girls are a dime a dozen, and after the build up of unusual attachment to Mike Myers, the audience cares little for these expendable boobs. Compton cries, screams, and makes all the wrong moves for a horror movie. Not only is she a far cry from Jamie Lee Curtis, but this girl looks ugly when she wails.

The supporting cast helps give Halloween its edge more than the sex and nudity. Brad Dourif as Sheriff Lee Brackett and Danny Terjo as Orderly Cruz give a sense of credibility to the production, and perhaps Zombie should have again veered from the original film and brought more to these adults. Perhaps it would be intriguing to see how adults respond to the sex and death these teens put up with, how an adult would deal with the psycho killer. Sybil Danning and Dee Wallace are also used all too briefly in key scenes that are surprisingly well scripted.

Zombie veers none from the essential elements established in the original Halloween script penned by Carpenter and Debra Hill, yet the redressed ending leaves much to be desired. Where the extra Michael opening was oddly fascinating, I couldn’t wait for the Laurie versus Mike Myers ending to be over. Overlong, near constant screaming in dark dirty places, Zombie is certainly appealing to slasher fans of yore, but mainstream audiences won’t be impressed.

Rated R for lots of language, sex, and nudity, Halloween offers little scares or gore. Zombie shoots odd angles and plays with light versus dark effects, but in a franchise where this is essentially the ninth film, there’s little to spook anyone. I suspect its more about what looks cool or sexy-even though I didn’t find anything particularly sexy either. It’s a horror movie. You do it, you’re done in! Our theater showing had about twenty people, and I wasn’t the only one voicing predictions or commenting how stupid the characters seemed.

Zombie should have taken Halloween more on the dark psyche established, instead the film deteriorates into fan boy sex and visuals. Certainly there’s an audience for that, but Halloween had more intelligent potential than just a slasher movie. Pity.

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