Y’know? In the whole time I’ve been doing this channel,I don’t think I’ve talked about “Category III” films on here. It wasn’t really by choice per se, it’s just never really come up. So today? Let’s change that! In its simplest terms Category III refers to a rating system that was introduced in Hong Kong in 1988. Now…I’m not best versed in the history of Hong Kong cinema, so do please bear with me, but from my understanding, prior to 1988, if you lived in Hong Kong, there was no ratings system for films released in cinemas. Instead, rather than policing who could go and see movies, they policed the movies themselves with stringent restrictions on sex, violence and even moralistic takes, an example being that bad guys couldn’t be seen to win in the end. Assuming your film met the criteria set out (or could be edited to meet the criteria) your film would be pushed out to cinemas and anyone of any age could go and check it out.

This all changed however in 1986 when director John Woo released a movie called “A Better Tomorrow” , a gangster film that really pushed the boundaries of the then Hong Kong motion picture system. As such, there was an outcry from a cross section of the general public who were concerned that some films may have objectionable effects on children in parallels not TOO dissimilar to the Video Nasty outcry in the UK. After mounting pressure, a law was passed introducing “The Hong Kong Motion Picture Rating System” in November of 1988.

Similar to systems established in the UK, any film that was to be screened in Hong Kong from that date onwards would have to be submitted to the office for film, newspaper and article administration, who would extensively watch the film and grant it both a permit to be screened and a category rating depending on how explicit the content was, with only educational, instructional or religious films being exempt.

Cat I, IIA and IIB are advisory ratings, it’s basically at the discretion of the theatre or the parent to determine if they’re old enough to watch the movie or not. But Cat III DOES carry some legal implications and most movie theatres carry a legal right to check a person’s ID before issuing them with a ticket to see a Cat III film.

With Cat III films being a bit of a broad church you never can quite know what to expect from them, some can be rather mild, a couple of scenes of heavy gore here and there, a few nude shots…that’s your lot. On the other end of the wedge however you can end up with extremely graphic simulated rape films, movies of EXTREME torture gore and violence and much much worse.I think it’s fair to say these films do NOT fuck around.

So! In order to ease into the world of Cat III nice and gently, today! We’re going to be taking a look at 1991’s “The Holy Virgin Vs The Evil Dead” a sort of horror, sort of thriller, sort of martial arts movie, sort of action film with just a dash of comedy that within only the first 10 seconds of the opening title card alone, managed to more or less fully win me over! This ones pretty close to the “tame” end of the wedge, but still has a few moments that’d surprise.

The film opens with a montage of clips from moments we’ll see throughout the film and a weird, border lounge sounding title theme. This is rather misleading because the rest of the film is effectively a bit of an explosion of ideas and not *quite* as laid back as the theme tune would have you believe. It’s here that we’re introduced to Shiang Chin-Fei, a history professor at a local university who’s out on a field trip with a group of young female students. They’re having a bit of a party out in the woods when all of a sudden, the moon turns blood red and a mysterious being erupts out of the shadows and basically massacres everyone, knocking Shiang out cold.

When he finally comes to, it’s a bloodbath and he’s almost immediately taken in by the police who interrogate him heavily before seizing his passport and releasing him when his brother turns up to pay bail. But the superintendent at the station puts two detectives on Shiang’s trail to see if he incriminates himself when back out in the open. While heading away from the station, everything pretty much all kicks off AGAIN when Shiang spots a person who looks almost EXACTLY like the killer he saw in the woods. He almost immediately starts violently wailing on them until the detectives rush in and restrain him, they let him go with a warning that if he tries something like that again, he really WILL end up back at the station.

We then cut to later in the day and a scantily dressed woman called Shaman is enjoying some downtime with one of the detectives who’s been trailing Shiang who goes by the name of Chen. Just as things are about to turn a little…heated. Chen gets a message through on the police radio to say that Shiang has been spotted at a particular set of coordinates…and that’s problematic because those coordinates, are directly outside the house that Chen and his lady friend are currently hooking up in. They rush outside and it’s revealed that Shiang and Shaman have a history together and that he’s here to grab the last of his things from her place.Its here that the beginnings of the main plot start to form.

Later that evening a couple are out having sex in a car, when our killer from the opening of the film swoops in, kills the guy and kidnaps the woman. He returns to a makeshift shrine and after some caressing, he basically eats her flesh. The police turn up and begin trying to find clues as to what exactly has happened. When the guy who came to bail out Shiang from prison rocks up again to take some photos of the crime scene (and in particular its moustachioed shrine) before asking Chen if there were any leads on the case. This is Chow. Shiangs somewhat daydreamy brother, and here he’s passing himself off as a private detective to try and find out what’s going on. He’s quickly escorted off the premises.

After searching the site they find some hair samples, which are later revealed to not be of any known human or animal on earth…oh and they also violently explode on a whim. Meanwhile Shiang and Chow head to the university’s library, where they’re greeted by a specialist librarian who, on seeing the photos of the shrine, takes the pair upstairs to a private archive of restricted texts. It’s here that the pair learn of ‘The Moon Goddess’ a deity from Chinlan folklore based out of Cambodia.

As the story goes, in 300 BC a large number of natural disasters ranging from tsunamis to earthquakes to the moon turning blood red rocked the Cambodian regions. Apparently the tribes of Chinla kneeled and prayed for mercy, at which point a goddess descended from the moon and stopped all the disasters. The tribes were so pleased by this that they set up temples in her name and referred to her as the “God of all mothers” and the “Goddess of the Moon”. They also find out that this goddess requires 3 female sacrifices to feast on every so often, or it is believed the natural disasters will return.

The guys put 2 and 2 together and realise that whoever is doing all of these murders must be doing so as part of some kind ritual for the Moon Goddess. And they pretty much head out to try and learn more. Meanwhile, later that night we’re introduced to Ma-Tian, a pipe smoking gentleman all in white who seems to have some kind of connection to our blood feasting killer. He raises a concern to the killer that he’s being a bit too cavalier and needs to tone things down a bit. He then gives the killer a strange contraption, telling him that in order to regain his full supernatural powers, he’ll need a specific type of woman to feast on, and that the device he’s provided will begin to bleed when he’s near such a woman.

And, almost immediately it starts bleeding when he enters town…and wouldn’t you know it, the woman he needs is none other than Shaman. Who is hanging around with Chen while he interviews the librarian that Shiang spoke to in order to find out WHAT exactly Shiang was looking into. With everyone caught up on each others business, our killer hops a fence and tries to kidnap Shaman, a messy fight breaks out in which the killers beaten, shot multiple times and eventually electrocuted in a pool, freeing Shaman and putting the killer in the morgue…where he seems to stay for about 20 minutes until he’s had his nap. At which point he gets up and kills the mortician.

Back at the library, the librarian and Shiang are working late into the night to try to get to the bottom of what they’re dealing with, and after some nice backing and forthing, the pair seem to be really connecting. Shiang has to leave for the night, but he tells her it would be nice to hang around in somewhat less formal circumstances sometime. Which the librarian seems keen on. Shiang heads out and almost immediately a blinding red light hits the librarian and we cut to Shiang sitting in a police station, being informed that the librarian was found both Decapitated and missing her heart.

He’s clearly upset but Chen offers some good news, he’s being removed from the suspects list and he can have his passport back. Chen takes Shiang and Chow back to Shamans place where the gang all have a drink and Shiang basically announces that he’s going to go to Cambodia to figure out what’s going on once and for all. At which point, we hard cut to Cambodia. Where we’re introduced to a local tribe with a very in demand princess. She’s the object of affection for most of the warriors and princes of the other tribes. The tribe have a simple test to see if the suitor is worthy, they just have to out manoeuvre her in an athletic display (either that or catch her…the subtitles wernt entirely clear) in either case shes fast as lightning, slippery as an eel and agile as a…agile thing. And no ones matched her yet.

It’s here that our Gang arrive in Cambodia and 2 things happen simultaneously, almost immediately Shaman gets kidnapped by Mi-Tians goons and our killer rocks up in cambodia and meets our princess, the pair have a violent exchange in which she attempts to blow him up, and he wounds the princess SO badly she ends up passed out on the roadside, where she’s found by Shiang and the guys, who take her back to the hotel, heal her up and try to get some more information out of her.

And this, in effect, leads us into our final act. As the princess reveals the killer’s true identity, the guys realise that Shaman has been kidnapped and mount a rescue attempt and the true powers of the moon goddess reveal themselves. Will Shiang and his crew manage to stop the curse of the blood moon!? Will the princess put an end to the killer!? And will the other detective who quits the force half way into the film ACTUALLY have a point in this thing? Well…all this and more will be answered if you check out “The Holy Virgin Vs The Evil Dead”

And I’ve gotta say, this film is an absolute delight. It’s a buffet of ideas presented in a fairly clean and concise manner. There’s a bit of something for most genre fans here and while, predominantly I’d say this was a martial arts film. I feel like it’s a bit of a disservice to categorise this as “Just a martial arts film” because layered on top of that martial artistry we have a decent amount of gory horror, some well managed thriller elements, some tongue in cheek comedy and even a hearty helping of erotica. And it seamlessly dips in and out of all of these genres with tremendous elegance in my opinion, ultimately creating an atmosphere that was just a total delight to sit through.

From a script perspective the things pretty rock solid. We have a decent three act structure that transitions smoothly from beginning to middle to end at *roughly* 30 minute intervals, we have some, more or less rock solid pacing that helps keep the film on track and in the groove, and tonally I think they get the balance JUST right in terms of knowing when an audience will have had enough of one type of genre and when to start pivoting into another thing. For example, the fight sequences are lengthy, but they throw in some more traditional action while the martial artistry is going on in the form of guns, explosions and similar. They try to establish the lore of this world’s history, but while doing so they’ll also experiment with special effects or just weird visuals that stop those scenes from feeling like we as the audience are just being talked at.

This is a movie thats seldom dull by any stretch of the imagination, and, to be honest, the only floor I found in the whole thing was Shamans kidnapping, which here, is a bit of a scene stuffing moment. It felt to me like the film was underrunning by 10 minutes or so. So in order to hit the 90 minute runtime they basically created a scenario where Shaman got kidnapped and as a result it allowed the rest of the cast to detour into a subplot for 10 minutes to pad out the clock. It doesn’t add anything really to the plot other than a VERY minor point about how Mi-Tian requires both Shaman and the history book of the moon goddess for some notorious purpose. Beyond that point, it adds nothing to the plot and about 5 minutes after the guys rescue Shaman from Ma-Tian he leads the group down into a cave system where he kidnaps her AGAIN. Which did annoy me a bit.

I’m also having some difficulty commenting on the dialogue written for this film, in part because it’s not in english, and in part because the subtitles included in the copy of the film that I saw, had burnt in subtitles that were in broken english. It looks like whoever transcribed the film for English speaking audiences went down the route of literal translation because there were moments where I had to pause the film and spend a few seconds re-reading (and in some cases re-re reading) lines to not only try and make out what was being said (because the subtitles had no drop shadow, so if the bottom of the screen went white at any point, your not reading them anymore…) but also to then take what was being said and make it make sense in modern spoken English.
Of what IS here that I can talk about, I think there’s some decent lines. This seems like a rather minimalist script, it doesn’t really waste all that much time with line stuffing. It basically puts across what it needs to put across pretty concisely and then it gets on with the punching and the kicking. Which I think is for the best really. It’s a really well crafted script, and having covered a fair chunk of martial arts and foreign action movies in my time. I’d absolutely say this was one of the more solid and entertaining offerings I’ve encountered.

The script was written by Ho-Kwan Lee he has 6 writing credits with his last being in 1992, being completely honest I don’t know if any of these films are more memorable than this one. But this ones a pretty good party, so if this is his best credit. I’d say he did a bloody good job. The film was directed by Chun-Ku Lu. He has 40 directing credits with their last entry being in the year 2000. Again; i’m not 100% sure if they made anything quite as unique as this production in their career. But if they didn’t. This is a hell of a good credit to have. Chun was really more of an Actor. With 54 credits in that field, and I *believe* He’s still active on the scene in that regard. So I wish him well!

On the direction front, this ones actually pretty solid, this is a relatively complex production given the extensive amount of choreography required for the fight scenes, the wirework and the fact that a decent chunk of the film is shot at night and given all the effects and other weirdnesses that have to be factored into the production. The end result clearly shows that Chun-Ku was on the ball with this thing as we have a stylized end product that really pulls out all the stops, and he clearly had experience of managing all the various crews and teams as here? It really feels effortless.

The same could be said for direction of the cast, who are for the most part incredibly fluid in there delivery of lines, giving the film the exact tone they need, Chun-Ku has helped shape their performances into an animated, decently vocalised and consistent production that’s allowed the cast to utilise the set space effectively, there’s a real sense that they were encouraged to work with props and the features within the location as there’s almost constant movement within the frame, which I thought was a really nice touch.

The fight choreography too here is nothing short of show stopping, we have several keen martial artists pulling out all the stops here, with soft touch combat and weapon play that’s worked into incredibly complex pieces of choreography, only enhanced by the speed at which the sequences have been played out AND the choice to speed up the footage to for added freneticism. This is arguably some of the best martial artistry I’ve seen displayed in a movie in a long time. And implementing the wirework into these sequences as well is what really helps pep up the sequences, giving the whole film a definite lift that takes it from being pretty good, to something truly spectacular.

As for the cine? We’re again playing with something really quite nicely handled. Shots have clear thought put into their compositional choices, blocking is implemented effectively and there’s a wonderful use of colour throughout with pastels contrasting rich greens, reds and blues to create something very vivid and striking that suits the tone the films going for down to the ground.

There’s a lot of experimentation on display throughout, especially within the more effect laden shots, and this willingness to try new things creates sequences that are varied, intricate and genuinely refreshing in a genre that has a real trouble with just locking off a camera and letting two or more people wail on each other, uncut (barring crash zooms) for 10 minutes. This is especially effective in the editing around the fight sequences where they’ve managed to not only frame the shots PERFECTLY so that the soft contact fighting feels weighty but also to hide any instances where they’ve had to go no contact. It also makes the scenes with swords, guns and more feel a lot more dangerous than they probably were. Which is EXACTLY what a good, solid sequence should do. It’s tight, well handled and looks great. So a big thumbs up from me on this front.

Performance wise? Again it’s pretty solid! As mentioned, the cast utilise their set spaces well, they’re animate, deliver their lines fluidly, with JUST the right amount of passion and energy this kind of film needed to take it into a slightly more campier area. And critically, they aren’t afraid to add a bit of darkness or pathos to their performances where required. Which is perfect for this kind of film as it creates a wonderful contrast of lighter more mirthy moments working in tandem with hard gore, murder and other bleakness. It’s great.

Of note; Donnie Yen is a fantastic leading man here as Shiang working a full range across the runtime and effortlessly flipping from acting style to acting style as new situations present themselves. He’s a fantastic performer and I can’t wait to see some of his other movies to really get a feel on his range in other genres. Pauline Yeung also astounds as the Princess in this, having a real sense of independence and mobility that just isn’t seen really in films from this time. She’s straightforward, blunt, no nonsense and a total powerhouse here who swipes first and asks questions later. A fantastic performance quite honestly.

Ben Lam as Sgt. Chen is also good and solid, acting as a good foil to Donnie Yen and offering *Just* enough difference to Yens performance to compliment the rest of the cast nicely. That’s not to play down the other cast members however, who also excel here. In fact, I honestly can’t really think of a bad performance in this thing, everyone seems switched on, in the zone and most importantly it looks like they’re having fun. Which is great to see and reflects nicely in the quality of the output.

And finally; The soundtrack! And I think the most distinct thing about this is simultaneously how generic the music is in this film and how tonally out of place it is for this kind of picture. It sounds like lounge muzak. If it was in a romance movie or a comedy, I wouldn’t bat an eye, it’d just come across as overly generic, but a relatively reasonable fit. Here? Well…imagine if Terrifer was almost entirely scored with upbeat 80s pop. because that’s basically what’s happening here. And it’s a frankly bizarre but somewhat inspired choice. I can’t explain HOW it works, but it’s a contrast that I very much got on with. And arguably, given how many of these martial arts movies I’ve see; it’s one of the better scores outside of mainstream examples of the genre.

The Holy Virgin vs The Evil Dead was released on VHS in the UK in 1991 by Eastern Heros Video. I can’t find a big box or ex-rental release for this title. It looks like it basically went straight to a retail release. While I cant find any information to suggest the film was cut on its release. Given the BBFC’s absolute disdain for the martial arts genre, I’d be genuinely surprised if this movie came out in the UK in ‘91 without SOMETHING being trimmed out.

It was released on DVD in the US in the mid 2000’s but it’s long out of print, there’s surprisingly little information on it available online and again, I can’t tell for sure if it’s cut or not. Finally in June 2020 Gold Ninja Video released the film fully uncut on bluray with a wonderful raft of extras and easter eggs, including a full feature commentary, a Donnie Yen retrospective, a trailer pack and not 1 but TWO additional movies included! It was a limited edition set with only 300 copies being produced, but they later ran a non limited, limited edition version that was available via an indie gogo campaign. Which I MORE than took advantage of.

The print quality here is a little rough around the edges, but Gold Ninjas M.O is to present these films exactly as they would have been found in video stores, what takes things to the next level is the fact they provide the supplemental materials that help give the films weight and add story, it makes them come alive in a way that just randomly stumbling on them wouldn’t. which I think they’ve achieved quite nicely here, not only does the film look about as good as it’s ever looked on home media, but the extras compliment this set brilliantly, and should it ever become available again, I’d absolutely suggest picking it up.

The Holy Virgin Vs The Evil Dead was a rollercoaster of a picture, with stunning visuals and fight choreography, solid direction, a simple but VERY decently handled script, fun performances that were interesting and engaging. It’s lively, weird and wonderful and I think it’s one of the best martial arts movies I’ve seen in a good while. Definitely one I can recommend, I think this would probably pair up quite well with something like “Lady Terminator” So, if you’re looking to blow the cobwebs off your martial arts collection, I’d say give this one a go!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-holy-virgin-versus-the-evil-dead/1/

1978’s Supersoul Brother, Also known as “The Six Thousand Dollar-” Noooooooooooo no. we won’t be calling it that…that we will not be calling it…Sees us return after something of an absence to the blaxploitation genre. I have a fondness for the genre, but I always seem to never quite get round to covering more of them. So! I’m hoping to change that today! And here we have a picture that…well, it kind of defies genre definition. The closest I can really pin it down to is that it’s basically a knock off attempt at making a Rudy Ray Moore film, but without Rudy Ray Moore. Instead, filling the position of the man of action is “Wild Man ” Steve Gallon. A comedian, entertainer and media personality who clearly wanted a piece of the pie that Rudy had established with films such as “Dolemite” and “The Human Tornado ”.

Going one further, Steve was actually friends with Rudy Ray, having appeared in one of Rudy’s films “Peaty Wheatstraw”. And so, in 1978 with a skeleton crew, whatever money could be fished out from the couch cushions and a lot of heart. Steve reached out to up and coming talents “Rene Martinez Jr.” and “Laura S. Diaz” with the pitch that he wanted to make a picture that was a comedic take on “Superman” with an all black cast. The first Christopher Reeves film was in production around this time, so Steve presumably felt like it was a good opportunity to capitalise on it. However, the budget wouldn’t stretch that far, and so, revisions had to be made. And as time went on the film’s scope and scale shrunk and shrunk until eventually…we arrived at “Supersoul Brother” one of Florida’s finest outputs…im not kidding.

The film opens in a laboratory belonging to one, Dr. Dippy and his assistant Peggy. Dr. Dippy is a little on the suspect side and is currently receiving funding from two gangsters called Bob and Jimmy in an attempt to produce a serum that, when injected, will hopefully turn the subject into a super strong, bulletproof ultraman. All of the experiments so far have been conducted on mice and they’ve garnered mixed results. The serum has done the job up to the point of transforming the mice into ultra strong killers. But the downside it comes with a side effect where the subject, once injected, will only live for 6 days. At which point they’ll die a painful death.

The Gangsters are happy with the former developments, but not the latter. When Pressed Dr. Dippy says work on a ‘Neutralizer’ that’ll prevent death after 6 days is in the works, but isn’t quite there yet. Not content with the slow progress Bob and Jimmy press Dr. Dippy to jump to Human trials. Dippy says that no one in their right mind would agree to be the test subject for a serum that is not only completely untested on humans, but is guaranteed to kill them after 6 days. But Bob and Jimmy don’t much care for ‘experts’ and basically head out to go and round someone up.

And it’s here that we’re introduced to Steve, a homeless Wino down on his luck who’s the victim of repeated attacks from people in the neighbourhood who accuse him of stealing bottles and newspapers. After a particularly unpleasant encounter in which Steve is knocked out cold. He’s spotted by Bob and Jimmy, who pick him up, take him to the lab and promise him a home and supplies if he agrees to undergo some examinations and testing. Steves out of it but half agrees and before we know it we’re back in the lab and Steves getting a physical from Peggy, the pair hit it off briefly and the results come back saying he’s all clear. As such, Bob and Jimmy push Dr. Dippy into running the experiment on him.
In order to butter Steve up for the experiments, Bob gifts him a place, and leaves him in the company of a young lady in a VERY saucy maids outfit, with the promise that she’ll do whatever he wants her to, no questions asked…So naturally, The first thing on his mind…is a delicious feast and someone to wash his ass…im not kidding, that’s literally all he wants…oh yeah they have sex. But that’s treated as an afterthought, an “Oh yeah! And while you’re at it” moment if you will. Anyway, after a good night’s rest, Steve returns to Dr. Dippy’s office refreshed and ready to undergo some further tests. At the end of this, he’s given some medication and told to rest up and NOT TO EAT A SINGLE THING beyond midnight, as the experiments will formally begin the next day at 10am. (This points never brought up again)

Overhearing that Steve needs to take it easy and be cared for, Peggy offers to head home with Steve to keep an eye on him and make sure he’s as peaceful as possible. The gang reluctantly agree and as soon as they get home, Peggy tries to look after Steve while Steve tries to have sex with Peggy. And this goes on for AGES with a fair dollop of homophobic and questionable humour thrown in to boot! This all leads to the revelation that Peggys a virgin. At which point Steve practically drags Peggy to the bedroom for some rather sketchy “Bouncy Bouncy”.

Finally, the day of the experiment arrives, Steves nervous, but after some reassurance, he willingly takes a jab to the buttocks and BOOM! Within an instant our homeless alcoholic is now the world’s strongest unmurderable man! Which they illustrate by having him bend a steel pipe, lift a heavy safe and as a bit of a treat, Bob takes Steve back to the scrubland where the people who accused him of stealing papers hang out, where Steve gets to wail on them uninterrupted for a bit.

And it’s here really that we enter our final act. As Bob manages to convince Steve that he’s in the business of testing other businesses’ security systems and that, as a practical joke. He wants to take Steve to a jewellery store and take their safe away while the front desk is distracted. Steve questions the plan because it doesn’t sound like THAT funny of a joke. But Bob responds that it’s a joke that the Jewelry store owners would understand and that it’ll also help them tighten their security when they see how easy it was for someone to walk in and take their safe. Steve seems happy enough with this, and with that! The raid is on!

In a…actually kind of slow going final act. Will Steve find out the truth about Bob, Jimmie and the super serum? Will Peggy and Steve let their true feelings be known!? and…Why is Dr. Dippy living as an underground dodgy doctor when he’s been able to design a serum that can literally *temporarily* create an army of super soldiers. The total value of the project is $6000 which in modern day money is almost $27 grand. Which is NOTHING compared to some budgets for medical research/testing or production. This man made super serum for around the same cost of some cars. There would be some companies willing to bite his arm off for that kind of patent. ugh…I don’t know…what I DO know is that all this and more WILL be answered if you check out ‘Supersoul Brother’

And to be completely up front with you, this movie isn’t very good. Apart from the fact that the films only 74 minutes long and that it takes 45 minutes for the ACTUAL advertised plot of the movie to begin. I found it to be a rather flat and uninteresting experience in all honesty.

For starters, the scripts a bit of a piss take honestly. There’s some serious structuring issues on display here, with the first and second acts kind of blending together into a one note, repetitious and padded mess. Seriously, all that really happens in the first 2 acts of this thing is, we get told about the serum, Bob and Jerry find Steve, bring him in, feed him, clothe him and let him fuck. And then it’s the final act! There’s a weird tonal shift in the 3rd act as well. The first 2 felt like some kind of ‘real life’ ‘drama’ (I hate using that term here because it doesn’t fit, but it’s the best I can come up with) with heavy handed and dire comedy elements dropped in randomly, but the third act feels more like a narrative driven thriller with a lot more physical comedy present. Which is a bit jarring honestly, it kind of feels like there’s 2 films here (everything up to the jab and post jab) battling it out for the audience’s interest. Which is quite unusual for a piece like this.

As I mentioned earlier this film is very reminiscent of the works of Rudy Ray Moore, and what I like personally about Rudys films is that his films not only have a sincerity about them that came from Rudy as a person. But the comedy throughout was a layered mixture of intentional and unintentional gags. I personally find the standup sections of ‘Dolemite’ to be a bit dull, but I LOVE Rudy’s characters when they play larger than life and oftentimes it can just be the way he delivers a line or reacts that can be the saving grace of a movie.

Here? Steve is clearly trying to make a film that apes Rudy’s style. And while I wont deny he has heart and this film *largely* feels sincere. It completely lacks that element of the unintentional. There’s maybe a handful of lines that are delivered in such a way that raises a chuckle, maybe the occasional look to camera that could startle a titter. But the vast VAST majority of the film’s comedy comes from Steve trying out his standup material. And he’s just not got that solid a set to carry the film on that alone in my opinion. His attempts at being over the top feel forced and at times can just come across as irritating. I can appreciate what he’s trying to do here. But I couldn’t escape the fact that this was a film built on bad comedy, with maybe a 25% hit rate if i’m being generous and the cheapness of the whole production just made things feel a bit desperate. This film absolutely didn’t need attached to it.

Only making things worse, most of the dialogue is over written, convoluted and lacks fluidity. I mean, the cast don’t help the situation (more on that later) but this is a very wordy, very ‘written’ sounding script that really lacks the sharpness or finesse that a comedy like this needs. I think it absolutely needed a few more drafts, and I was left thoroughly irritated by the fact that the film’s main marketing point, the thing that SOLD the movie. Was relegated to 24 minutes at the back end of the picture with next to no actual development of that idea beyond a single heist and a total lack of spectacle when it came to the ‘superhuman’ powers. All we get is Steve lifting 2 heavy things about 4 times total. With over 50 minutes of the production being a total runaround waste of time.

Had they structured the film properly, the first act would have dealt with them finding Steve, preparing him for the experiment and getting him jabbed, the 2nd act would have been him learning about his powers, maybe doing a few spectacular things and maybe a couple of heists. And the 3rd act would have had Steve find out he’s being played and the confrontation with the doctor, Bob and Jimmie. Instead, it’s a wash out.

As mentioned the script was written by Laura S. Diaz. This is her only writing credit and if IMDB is to be believed, she never worked in film again. The film was also amended and directed by Rene Martinez Jr., an at the time, up and comer with 3 directing credits and 2 writing credits. Their best known work is probably another blaxploitation flick “The Guy from Harlem” but their other credit “Road of Death” is apparently well liked and known too. This was their final directing credit and they also seemingly dropped away from directing shortly after this film.

On the direction front. Again, it’s just…not that great. We’re dealing in the absolute barest minimums here. Rene is able to wrangle lighting, sound and camera to work together in such a way that’s produced a product that JUST…JUST manages to hold itself together across the runtime. But that is by NO means an indication of quality. While these elements have resulted in a production that can *just about* be CALLED a production. They’re all running fairly independently and as such there’s a definite case of peaks and troughs in terms of what’s been presented. Good direction wrangles all the elements of cast AND crew to create a piece of cinema that is both competent, clean and coherent while also giving the film a sense of style or distinction that acts as the directors signature mark.

This film is not distinct, it’s a film from 1978 that almost looks as rudimentary as some of the poverty row monster movies of the 1940’s. In fact, in some ways it’s even less than the poverty row monster movies of the 1940’s because at least THOSE movies would often have action, suspense, a monster of some description. This thing has NONE of that. Its flat, lifeless “Get the job done” fodder, that almost HAD to be that way due to the incredibly low budget of the production. There wasn’t a lot of money for sets, props or other things, so the majority of the film is shot outdoors or in locations that the crew had access to film in. As such it feels VERY cobbled together and spur of the moment.

Direction of the cast doesn’t fare much better, we have a rather small cast list, with most actors outside of the core cast of 5 appearing on screen for less than a couple of minutes each. And not ONE person here outside of Steve looks like they have a SINGLE idea what the hell is going on, because the cine is so basic, and no doubt retakes were limited due to the cost of film stock. Most of the actors stay firmly bolted into place throughout there scenes, reading their lines as if it was the first time they’d ever seen it (with mixed results) largely with a look in their eyes that would suggest that something horrendous was going on just off screen. They seem confused, aimless and I genuinely get the impression that the director, AT MOST, talked them through a scene and then just did a take until they got the lines as close to right as possible. It’s shocking quality…it really is.

The cine is positively lifeless. Shots are washed out, drab and uninteresting, with no thought, rhyme or reason put into composition. Everything appears ‘floodlit’ meaning a lot of the sets have heavy shadowing as the cast go through their scenes, there’s almost no experimentation, everything is basically wides, mids or head and shoulder reverse shots for conversations. The most extreme cine we get is a pan for god’s sake…it’s just dire…it really is.

It does get worse though, because the cine is SO basic, it has a knock on effect with the sequence building, and I am 90% convinced this thing was cut with a knife and fork at this point. For the most part, they’re overly basic sequences with maybe a couple of shot types cut in to help break up the flow, nothing intense, nothing creative. It’s better than just cutting raw rushes together. But not by much. What IS a problem however, is there are some scenes where, for some reason, they’ve absolutely failed to cut the film correctly.

The one that sticks out in my mind is the footage around the Jewelry heist. For some reason, they decide to use smash cuts from an ‘over the shoulder’ 2 shot of a conversation, to a reverse shot thats a close up head and *sort of* shoulder shot of the jewellery store clerk. But the way they’ve timed the cuts means she’s always *just* Out of time in responding to the conversation, they cross the line to put her face on screen, and they use mixed audio sources, meaning she goes from sounding distant in the over the shoulder shots, to crystal in the forward facing ones.

To your average joe, they may pick up on the fact that something is not quite right with the sequence. But as an editor. This film made me want to commit war crimes. It’s just so underwhelming, irritating and poorly planned, it’s worse than some of the lower budgeted SOV movies I’ve covered on here in the past, and THAT’S saying something. Not helped either by the fact that the existing film print for this picture, as you can see, is absolutely trashed. I’m told that the DVD release for this is actually a MASSIVE improvement over previous releases, which were apparently basically unwatchable. But even so, this looks rough.

Performance wise? The only performer worth your time here is Wildman Steve, he’s got the largest share of lines in this movie, he tries to keep animated and lays the jokes on thick and fast, and overall I’d give him a pass. He doesn’t have much in the way of range here. But he’s solid enough. Joycelyn Norris as Peggy is fairly solid, but unfortunately doesn’t get too much to do here. Which I am genuinely a bit upset about because, of what I’ve seen of her performance I think she could have had scope to be a decent ‘Straight guy’ to Steve’s pratfalling mischief. Instead she’s relegated to a supporting role that doesn’t give her a lot to do, but I personally think she’s a bit of a hidden gem here and that, with the right director she probably could have given a relatively solid performance.

The rest of the cast really kind of failed to ‘light my fire’ they all felt stiff as a board and twice as wooden. As mentioned, none of them seem to really know what’s going on for most of the runtime, most of them do NOT deliver their lines confidently and, for the most part I wouldn’t be surprised if they either had cue cards off screen or if there was a chronic need to look up lines because, whats on display here has got to be some of the worst read dialogue i’ve heard this season…and THAT’S saying something. They barely animate, they don’t utilise props or set space effectively, they might as well be on a black backdrop for as much as the set matters to these cast members. It’s honestly ridiculous.

And finally; The Soundtrack, if you like slightly demented funkadelic sounding music that sounds like it’s being played underwater, this is your soundtrack! It’s muffled, bizarrely utilised with some scenes getting music and others having total silence. And it sounds almost like they raided a sound library and grabbed whatever they could. Because the mixed quality of the recordings is beyond distracting. It’s not a hit by any sense of the word.

The general audio quality is a mixed bag too, I have to assume they didn’t get much in the way of room tone when they shot this movie, because what’s presented here is a patchwork of audio recordings ranging from relatively clear for low budget 1978, to basically inaudible. But rather than picking the best take and synching sound around that, they cut from audio take to audio take with no processing to help smooth over the cuts. As a result it’s a VERY jankey mix with a balance that goes all OVER the place and is incredibly distracting. This is not a great cinematic experience.

Supersoul brother was released on VHS by Xenon Home Video in 1989, I’m also led to believe there were a couple of bootleg iterations of the movie floating about before ‘89 and after the official release. But Im struggling to nail down any specific dates or labels. I don’t doubt there were boots floating around, I just can’t find anything concrete. But if you know of any, do let me know in the comments! From what I can gather it also had some DVD bootlegs in the 2000’s, but its official DVD premier arrived in 2015 when Vinegar Syndrome teamed up with the AGFA to put the film out on shiny shiny disc.

As mentioned the picture quality is pretty atrocious, and this is the film with some level of remastering so, lord knows what the condition of the unremastered film print looks like. It’s watchable, But it’s a FAR cry away from their usual output. No extras on the release either! Just the movie and a scene select on a basic menu. Which is a shame, as I’d genuinely love to learn a bit more about this picture, trivia is very thin on the ground. So this could have been an ample opportunity to help make the film come alive. Instead, it does rather have a bit of a ‘dumped on disc’ feeling about it. In either case, it went out of print in 2023 after one of vinegar syndromes flash sales, but there are copies floating around on Ebay if your curious…not that i’d recommend it.

Supersoul brother has heart. To a certain extent it has charm. But that’s where the niceties begin and end unfortunately. This is a production that, ultimately has been hindered both by the lack of budget and the lack of a skilled cast and crew. In proper hands, I haven’t a doubt in my mind that this film could have been one of the greats, the pitch sounds brilliant! But because money was so tight and the crew were winging it for the most part, it left a film that has an underdeveloped and overly wordy script, direction and cine that’s basic, bland, lifeless and drab. A patchwork soundscape, performances that could best be described as “startled” and comedy that has an incredibly low hit rate, with comedians trying WAY too hard, to the point that it almost becomes irritating. And that’s not even the half of it.

The only way I could recommend ‘Supersoul Brother’ is if you were doing a Rudy Ray marathon and wanted something to help add a bit of variety in, in between pictures. Outside of that, this films a really poor show in my opinion, not one I’ll revisit on its own and not one I can recommend, even if you’re into the blaxploitation genre. There are WAY better productions out there and honestly? This isn’t worth your time.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/supersoul-brother/1/

1981’s “The House By The Cemetery” Is a supernatural horror slasher from our good friend in gore and gross out Lucio Fulci. It’s also the concluding part of Fulci’s VERY loosely planned “Gates of Hell” Trilogy, and yes. I realise im doing this thing ass backwards, but when it comes to category 1 Video nasties (Which this VERY much is) sometimes we have to approach things the wrong way to get the results we need…hell if i’d have started with “The Beyond” then NO ONE would have been happy, so we’re gonna be working backwards through this sucker. And honestly; this one might end up a bit “Short and sweet”…

The film follows Norman, Lucy and their rambunctious little crotch goblin “Bob.” a fairly typical family living in New York who are soon to relocate. Y’see, Normans a researcher and he’s just been assigned a project to complete on behalf of his late colleague professor Peterson. Professor Peterson had a rather sudden and unfortunate demise in which it was discovered he was having an affair when his mistress was found brutally murdered and the professor was discovered a short time later hung in a nearby library.

So! Norman decides that this is the absolute perfect time to relocate his wife and kid RIGHT into Petersons former bloody abode “The House By A Cemetery” in Boston., with the aim of completing Petersons project and maybe finding out a bit more about how Petersons end came about. While all this is going on Bob starts receiving strange messages from a mysterious girl called May, who warns him to try to convince his family to avoid going to the house by ANY means necessary, this of course doesn’t really work out as the parents listen to what Bob has to say before pretty much immediately dismissing what he has to say because he’s like…8.

In any case they head over to the estate agents to get the keys and May tries once again to stress how important it is that Bob ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT GO ANYWHERE NEAR THE HOUSE. And Bob responds to this by getting out of his parents car and going to chill in a nearby patch of grass with some kind of strange doll he just…found. His parents find him in about 10 seconds (after the film gets an artificial tension scene out of the way because…y’know…runtime and all that) and with that, they make a quick jaunt to the house!

And in a tale as old as time, within minutes of landing and getting set up TWO key factors are brought up, one is that Lucy is off her medication because the side effects include “Hallucinations” and the other is the appearance of a mysterious, attractive and minimally spoken live in babysitter for Bob in the form of Anne, who has a weird fixation with the house and in particular the basement. Which is heavily boarded up in such a way that would imply that you probably shouldn’t open the thing, so you better believe that things getting opened up in the next 10-20 minutes.

After starting to get settled in we then cut to Norman, who’s up working late on Petersons research when he hears an unusual cry that sounds like a child. So he heads over to Bob’s room…but Bob’s fast asleep. Heading away he hears even louder commotion coming from the kitchen and on entering finds Anne by the basement door trying to pry the wooden bars off with the crying seemingly coming from within.

Nonplussed, The next day, Norman heads to a meeting at the library to catch up with one of the overseers of the project, who comments that it’s so nice to see him as it had been a while since he last saw him and he asks about Nomans daughter…which puzzles Norman as this is the first time he’s been here and he doesn’t have a daughter. While that’s going on Lucy begins to more properly clean up the house and while moving an old rug from the living room she stumbles on some kind of stone artefact. A stone artefact that’s a little too religious to REALLY just be a stone artefact…it is infact…a tomb. The tomb of one Dr. Freaudstein.

A short time after discovering the tomb, Lucy too begins to hear the noises, they get louder and louder to the point that she has a full blown breakdown and that night after returning from work, Norman finds Lucy behind a chair weeping and mumbling to herself quietly. After some time trying to bring her back down to earth, the pair discuss the tomb, but Norman dismisses it as “A culture thing” claiming that, in the winter it was so cold that the ground was too hard to dig up, and that, in Boston at least. Burying a family member inside your home was as much a tradition as Christmas or labour day. (Any Bostonians watching this care to confirm?)

After an extended sequence in which Norman and Lucy decide to investigate the basement and come a cropper with some bats leading a particularly gory stabbing scene, May telepaths Bob once again to tell him to get out of the house, Lucy and Bob head out to run errands and while they’re gone the estate agent for the property turns up for a chat. Realising they’re out, she starts to head out herself, but when she steps on Freudsteins tomb, it crumbles, causing her to fall through the gap, damage her ankle at which point, a mysterious figure with necrotic hands appears brandishing a poker, with which he stabs the estate agent repeatedly before dragging her off to god knows where.

Some time passes and Lucy becomes increasingly unsettled by Anne (the big weirdo) so she goes to talk to Norman about it, Norman doesn’t really say all that much about her, but uses the opportunity to fill Lucy in on his research (…I love it when men are there emotionally y’know?) It transpires that Dr Peterson’s research had led him to the work of one Dr. Freudstein. An early 20th century surgeon who was dabbling in genetics and experimental operations. Norman is convinced that Peterson was already going a bit goofy, but when he relocated to Freudsteins house where all of the experiments took place…it was enough to drive him fully over the edge. Which is confirmed the next day, when Norman has to head to New York to speak to his boss to get permission to look into the Peterson/Freudstein link where he finds a personal tape from Peterson in which he madly rambles on about Freudstein amongst many MANY other things. Norman promptly destroys the tape and races home.

As we enter a…rather confusing final act really in which Bob and Mays relationship continues to grow and the mysterious noises from the house continue to get evermore present. Will Norman finally discover what Peterson was up to?Will Anna find out what’s in the basement? and …Why DO so many people hate Bob? Like, I don’t exactly “like” him…but I don’t hate him NEARLY as much as most of the “horror community” profess too…I’ve seen much more annoying kid characters in horror beyond him…eh…Either way, most of these questions will be answered if you watch “The House By the Cemetery”.

And, honestly? Of the three “Gates of hell” movies, this ones probably the one that makes the least amount of sense (mild spoilers from here on out unfortunately, but it’s kind of necessary) So, the biggest problem the script has is purely around how wishy-washy it can get in places when it comes to what’s ACTUALLY important and real, and what’s just…not. They regularly focus on detail or information across the films runtime that just, isn’t really relevant. At one point when Norman and Lucy go to explore in the basement there’s a fleeting moment where the camera focuses on a ring. And you think “Ahh! That’s going to play into this somehow in some way!…” Never gets bought up again.

The point of Anne as a character in this is totally confusing and ultimately pointless…At first she’s introduced with the hint that she knows something that the family don’t when it comes to what’s going on in the basement. The film then ramps things up even MORE implying that Norman may be about to have an affair with Anne in the same way that Peterson cheated on his wife with a mistress at the house (giving some hint that the house has a malevolent presence) THEN the film kinda starts to imply that Anne may in some way be influencing Bob as she take him out to places fairly regularly but has inconsistent or vague recallings about what she ACTUALLY did with Bob for the hours that they were gone.

None of that matters. Because it transpires that, No. Anne doesnt know what’s going on in the basement (at most she might have a hint of an idea. But given her reaction when she actually SEES what’s going on down there, I don’t think she had a scooby) NO. She isn’t going to have an affair with Norman, in fact, apart from 2 scenes I don’t think the pair even directly talk to each other…and NO. she isn’t influencing Bob. Anne is a macguffin of a character, invented to artificially extend the runtime and very little else, she turns up, acts weird, then goes into the basement and gets decapitated. And the fact that the film invests so much time introducing and building her up only to do nothing with it upsets me.

There’s a LOT of just…totally random moments in this where you get shown something, or a character will say something in passing that makes you think. “Oh that’ll be important” and then it just…never is, or if it does come up again it’s for completely out of left field reasons that don’t make a whole lot of sense.

I also kind of disliked the ending. (Skip to the “Who wrote this” chapter if you don’t want to be majorly spoiled from here) but…at the end of the film, it’s revealed that Dr. Freudstein has been living in the families basement and that he’d been working on an experiment to achieve immortality by draining people on a cellular level of their “energy” in order to revitalise himself. They all head down to the basement, where Freudsteins waiting for them, a scuffle ensues and Norman gets killed, Lucy and Bob try to escape, but the door won’t open, leading them to try and escape by busting out of the the tomb entrance in the living room (it turns out it’s actually a fake tomb entrance that Freudsteins been using to get in and out of the house)

There’s another scuffle, Fruedstein grabs Lucy and drags her down the stairs where she’s murdered off screen and in the final moments, Bob manages to just about bash through the rock where he’s rescued by May. But it turns out that, at some point in the rescue, Bobs been transported into a version of hell, where he’s to spend the rest of his days with May and (presumably) May’s mother. That’s the end of the movie.

And…while it’s refreshing to have a horror film from this time end with all our main characters dead (including the children…ESPECIALLY the children…) it did rather lead to a mute closing. I had a lot of questions, not a lot of answers and just felt fairly deflated. I mean, basic stuff here but…how has Freudstein managed to live from 1915 (his “death”) to 1981 when the only people we know who’ve lived in the house was Doctor Peterson and that HE only moved there to learn more about Feaudstein recently. How can the basement of the house be one of the “gates of hell” but also the tomb entrance/exit ACTUALLY be a different gate to hell, did Anne have some idea about all this or was she LITERALLY just a mcguffin.

I dunno…I just found it very underwhelming that Norman and Lucy both got killed (Lucy offscreen even! Which is a slap in the face honestly) and that the closing moments of the film are just “Well…everyones dead…g’night folks! Thanks for watching 3 of these!” I’d have just liked a bit more to the whole “Gates of hell” thing beyond “there are some gates to hell all around the world.” and that’s it. Because, as it stands…it’s a very underwhelming closure to what was otherwise an interesting idea.

Beyond that however, we have a relatively solid 3 act structure that has clearly indicated gear changes and, for what it’s worth, the pacing is pretty solid too, i’d say this is easily the best paced of the “Gates of hell” trilogy. It’s managed to massively slim down the padding and wordy exposition dumps while also keeping up the amount of violence, blood, guts and gore that anyone coming to a Fulci film expects.

I feel tonally after “City of the Living Dead” and “The Beyond” this film gets the balance between the cheesy and stereotypically generic Italian horror movies of that time and the more abstract and border absurd nightmare fuelled elements just about right. While “City” was decent, I found it WAY too cheesy and generic to be something I’d go out of my way to catch, especially given there are way more cheesy and entertaining movies out there from that time that do similar things, but more fully commit to the bit.

Equally; while I really liked “The Beyond” It did drag a bit in places because of the change in direction to something a little more serious and a bit more symbolic. This film is still fairly bedded into the abstract and subtextual world that “The Beyond” established. But it also isn’t afraid to embrace the guts, gore and gross out side of cinema that “City” pretty much lived and died by. It’s pretty central between those two movies, leaning ever so slightly towards “The Beyond” and I feel in doing that, it’s probably made the right move. It didn’t *fully* win me over. But I think of all three entries, from a script perspective at least, this was the one that most won me over, and it’s probably the film I’m most likely to put on on a whim out of the three.

In terms of dialogue? It’s…well it’s an Italian movie dubbed into English. It’s definitely not the worst i’ve seen, things are fairly fluid and make sense (for the most part) but don’t go into this expecting decently crafted, naturalistic and engaging dialogue. It’s messy, broken up, not as bad as something like say… “Bloody Moon” but not quite as “possible” as these things go. What I will say though (and I need to stress this because its important) is despite the lacklustre dialogue, despite the ropey ending and the total brick walls that the plot throws up randomly. This script is FUN. its daft, gory and *mostly* entertaining FUN. on a professional level, it deserves a drubbing. But as a movie going member of the public and schlub on the internet who’s been at this for over 6 years, I can’t deny I didn’t have a good time with this thing. Which means it’s pretty much halfway there to winning me over!

The script was written by Elisa Briganti, Dardano Sacchetti and Giourgiou Mariuzzo. Elisa has 15 credits in a career spanning over 23 years with highlights including “Zombie Flesh Eaters”, “1990: The Bronx Warriors” and “A Blade In The Dark”. Dardano has 96 writing credits across a 42 year career with hits including “A Bay of Blood” and “Cannibal Apocalypse”. His last credit was in 2013. And finally Georgiou has 52 writing credits, mainly for lots of dirty DIRTY erotica, but he also wrote “The Beyond” and “Aenigma” with his last credit being in 2012.

The film was directed by none other than a true Maestro of Italian Horror Lucio Fulci. The man was a powerhouse of the genre churning out pretty much all the tent poles that established the Italian slasher genre of the late 70’s and early to mid 80’s. Don’t believe me? *ahem* “Zombie Flesh Eaters”, “Cat in the Brain”, “The Devil’s Honey”, “The Beyond”, “City of the Living Dead”, “The New York Ripper” and the absolute STANDARD of horror cinema “Manhattan Baby”…okay i’m kidding with that last one, but Still..the guy knew his horror onions.

In fact he’s only one of TWO directors to have 3 or more pictures on the Section 1 Video Nasties list. With the only other person sharing such a title being none other than Jess Franco. He was a workhorse right through to the end, sadly passing away in 1996, but even then he still had several projects in active development with his final credit getting released a year later in 1997. The man WAS Italian horror. In the same way that Carpenter or Craven have come to define US horror of the 1980’s Fulci WAS one of the prominent horror directors on the scene at that time. And his body of work is as strong a case as you’ll find for that era.

On the direction front, What we have here is a much more subdued but focussed offering from Fulci. This isn’t “The Black Cat” or “Manhattan Baby” or “City of the living dead” where it’s constantly cutting to crash zooms, extreme gore or violence. It’s much more muted than that, but instead, it trades in atmosphere with the occasional bout of extreme violence to tide the viewer over. And I think it’s tight as a nut quite frankly. With this film, he’s managed to unite the cast and crew on a focussed goal that I feel has been achieved with a level of stylish zeal and relish. It’s by NO means a “showy” production, that’s not its function, but it IS a film that manages to build a wonderful sense of atmosphere that it maintains across its entire runtime, seldom faltering. I can honestly just really appreciate a well made rock solid production like this that DOESN’T feel the need to get up in my face, it knows it doesnt NEED to sell me anything, which means it can just crack on with what it’s trying to do.

Direction of the cast is fairly well handled too, they all seem highly animated and seem to have a good grasp of what they’re doing. A LOT of information is expressed through the occasional glance, the way props are utilised and the way the cast occupy the set space. In short, they do a good job. I can’t honestly fault them really beyond any of the general issues that plagued Italian horror of this era.

For me however, it’s the cine where the film probably has its weakest element. While the direction itself has created some wonderfully moody and atmospheric moments, I don’t feel it really properly translated that mood into the cinematography. This is a very flat, very dull looking production, predominantly shot in what looks like autumn or winter weather. It’s chronically grey and cold looking and given there are only really a very small handful of locations (the house, the basement, the graveyard and the library is about as varied as it gets) it means there just…isn’t a whole lot to look at.

While the occasional coloured gel shot comes out as a way to do “day for night” the lighting is flat and fairly uninteresting with most of the cine here that DID “wow” being undercut by the fact that it was “borrowed” from the previous 4 films that Fulci had worked on. You say Iconic, I say “stolen”. And if anyone wants to argue that Fulci cant steal cinematography off himself then ill shift from “Stolen” to “Lazy.” It’s all just a flat, dull and fairly bland affair, which is a shame because so much efforts gone into setting the moods on the locations and sets. I feel with just a bit more “oomph” behind the wheel on this front it really would have taken this film to the next level.

Performance wise? Well, Bob aside, it’s not a bad bunch really! Catriona MacColl as Lucy continues her wonderful stint in these films with a wonderful performance that is a tad melodramatic, but all the better for it! I’ve really enjoyed her across this run of films and it’s a shame she didn’t really do very much in Italian cinema after this, instead going into a career in television before recently returning to film in the last decade (I should really check some of those out…)

Paolo Malco is just about okay as Norman, if i’m being honest, I just feel like he doesn’t quite fit the bill for the role required. There’s no real fault with his performance, I just think he’s a little too *dreamy* for what is supposed to be a deeply involved researcher. They basically just shoved some glasses on a guy and went “He’s such a nerdy dork, check him out doing the science like a dork!” Like I say, I don’t think he’s BAD, I just don’t think he was the right fit here…He’s still fairly solid though, and manages to just about get through the movie without causing *Too* I’m very upset.

The rest of the cast…if i’m being honest are all fairly unmemorable. Most have only a handful of scenes and just about give good enough performances to get us through the runtime…there was no one here who I thought was particularly awful or of note for negative reasons. And where issues do arise I honestly think the problem lay more with the script than anything else…so yeh, on the whole…ehhhhhh…

And finally; the soundtrack! It suits the role of the film and nothing more, it’s synthy driven atmos tracks, similar to “The Beyonds” score, but because of that it’s much less innovative. If “City of the living deads” score felt like a rehash of “Zombi 2” and “The Beyonds” score felt like a breath of fresh air and a new step in the right direction for the works of Fulci, this? Feels a bit like panicked graspings to figure out what comes *after* you’ve reinvented yourself…like…it’s not offensive. I just felt by this point it had been done.

As for the ADR in this (or more specifically the English dub track) well…let’s just leave it at “It could have been better” eh?…let’s just leave it at that…

The House By The Cemetery was released on VHS in 1982 by Eagle films and in its debut it had a slight cut to a couple of the murders from the theatrical release bringing the runtime down to 84 minutes and 49 seconds. That seemingly wasn’t enough however to prevent it being put on the video nasties list in 1984 removing it from circulation for the best part of 4 years until, in 1988 it finally got re-released by Vipco, with just over 4 minutes of cuts made over the previous release. In 2001 it as released again on DVD this time with only 33 seconds of cuts before finally arriving on Bluray in 2009 courtesy of Arrow video fully uncut, the Arrow version is more than serviceable, but given the improvements in not only restoration technology but also home video tech in the last 15 years, it is starting to look a little choppy when compared to some of the more contemporary restoration releases, I don’t know if it’s an older encode, or a bit of a dodgy time with compression…but yeh, I reckon it could look nicer than it currently does. Still…at least it has Arrow’s signature “boat load” of extras to shore it up…

As for whether this should have been on the Video nasties list? No. no it shouldn’t have. While there are a couple of graphic murders dotted across this thing’s runtime, it’s otherwise nothing outside of your bog standard slasher fare. There’s nothing here that the original Friday the 13th or Halloween’s 1 and 2 were not doing WAY stronger around that time…frankly I think this is probably one of Fulci’s tamer efforts. But, that’s the nature of the video nasty game unfortunately…sometimes these films just wound up on here for LITERALLY no reason other than “it has a woman being menaced for a bit in it”…shocking really.

Ultimately; with ‘The House by the Cemetery’ I was left a bit conflicted, but ultimately won over. It’s just a quite well made fun little Italian slasher picture that showcases a slightly different tact from Fulci and while I don’t think it’s by any stretch a “Great” film, the fact that it acts a bit like a bridging point between “City of the Living Dead” and “The Beyond” in terms of it carrying some of the gross out elements and character development tropes from “City” and marrying them up to the suspense, ultra violence and stylistic choices of “The Beyond” was what ultimately won me over. It’s not one I’d come back to again and again. But of the three, this ones probably the one I’m most likely to pop on purely from its own merits. And it’s definitely one I’d recommend if you’re looking for a good entry point into Italian horror in general.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-house-by-the-cemetery/1/

I have experienced fever dreams less vivid and demented than 1983s Carnival Magic. And I feel the need to establish that up front alongside putting this warning *Ping* on screen throughout this review because. To be honest I don’t entirely know what to make of this thing. It’s literally supposed to be a kids film, but I feel like making a kid sit through this thing would be akin to committing one of the “Forbidden Experiments”. I’m getting ahead of myself a bit though, so…maybe I should wind back a little.

Carnival Magic is a 1983 kids adventure movie directed by veteran exploitation master Al Adamson. Al for the majority of his 23 year career in film making had predominantly bedded himself into horror and sexploitation pics such as “Dracula vs Frankenstein” or “ “Lash of Lust” but for reasons that…have ultimately been lost to time and are frankly too bewildering to contemplate. After completing work on his last pair of pictures “Nurse Sherri” and “Death Dimension” Al decided that he wanted a new challenge and set his sights on wanting to produce a kids film to play solely at matinee.

At the time, the matinee slot for kids films, despite being understated was surprisingly popular and you could make good money putting films on as part of double features for parents to drop their kids off to for some “screentime babysitting” So what happens when you take a filmmaker 22 years into their career as a graphic and gory sexy exploitation director and set him up making a movie that’s core demographic probably couldn’t even do their times tables? (im sure there’s overlap between those two audiences) well…you get Carnival Magic.

The film was shot over 3 weeks in 1980 in south carolina at the Peach Festival Carnival with the main star being Trudi an aging female chimp who had been deemed to be too old to be used in the film safely, chimps have a habit of y’know…not giving a fuck past a certain point of maturity and this was illustrated perfectly well when Trudi had had enough of filming one day and full on headbutted a script advisor while on set. Putting the guy in the hospital for several days.

Nevertheless, the shoot was cheap and cheerful and after that the film spent 3 years in both post production and distribution tendering before making its way up to screens on a limited run where it bombed HARD and vanished into the either, being considered lost for the best part of 26 years. So. with that in mind; what’s this absolutely mental monkey movie ACTUALLY about. Well…

Carnival Magic takes place at a small time, travelling fair owned by down on his luck carnival operator “Stoney”. In the opening of the film it’s established that the Carnival has landed on hard times and that, without a major attraction to help shake things up, the carnival will have to close at the end of the season. From here we’re then introduced to two of Stoney’s biggest carnival attractions Kirk, a wild animal expert who may or may not be mistreating his animals and a mysterious “quiet” magician called Markov.

Kirk and Markov don’t see eye to eye, the main reason being that Markov continually keeps sneaking into Kirk’s animal tent and “Staring out” Kirk’s tigers. Kirk claims that whenever Markov does this, the animals flip out and basically refuse to follow his instructions anymore. It’s revealed that Markov in fact has some kind of psychic/telepathic ability that allows him to read people’s minds, hypnotise and influence people and most critically, it allows him to communicate with animals.

While the film doesn’t explicitly say what Markov and the tigers “Discuss” its clear that Markov has some influence over teaching them about respect. And that annoys Kirk who basically informs Stoney that he either needs to get rid of Markov or he’ll quit. Stoneys not left with much of a choice due to Kirk being the carnivals main draw and heads over to give Markov his papers. Stoney tells Markov he can stay till the end of the week, but Markov tells Stoney he’ll be gone by morning.

That night; Markov takes a walk out in the woods, but…somethings not quite right. He’s talking to someone, or rather…something, specifically he’s telling whoever or whatever that it’s becoming increasingly hard for him to hide them from public attention, and that he doesn’t know how much longer he’s going to be able to keep it up. While on the way back to his caravan he passes by a tent and spots Ellen (otherwise known as Buddy) asleep on a bench. Ellen is Stoney’s daughter and runs the ticket booths around the carnival. Ellen’s mother wasn’t built for the carny lifestyle and ran away when Ellen was very young, breaking Stoney’s heart and leading him to only ever call Ellen “Bud” and dressing her masc in order to stop Stoney from feeling quite so upset about the situation. But Ellens not happy with things as they sit.

Markov wakes her up, and tries to get her to her bed. But as the pair are leaving the tent, Markovs secret is revealed. Markov has a monkey! A TALKING Monkey! A talking monkey who can do magic tricks, reads magazines and is domesticated to the point it can cook a meal, sweep floors and much much more! This, is Alex. A monkey that Markov trained in his ways of psychic and telekinetic abilities with his unfortunately passed away wife Sara. The pair have been travelling together since Saras death and Markov is fiercely protective of where Alex goes and what he gets up to. Ellen is astounded by Alex’s monkey magic and begs Markov to show Stoney as she’s convinced this is the act that’ll save the carnival. But apart from the fact that Markov DESPERATELY doesn’t want to turn Alex into a sideshow attraction. He tells Ellen that he’s been sacked and will be leaving in the morning.

After some backing and forthing with Ellen, Markov decides to leave the decision up to Alex, he explains the situation and effectively says that, if he doesn’t want to be in the limelight, that’s understandable. But that him and Markov can only stay together as long as Markov has the funds to keep Alex fed and he can’t guarantee that’ll be the case if they have to leave the Carnival. Alex says he wants to perform and so, the next day Ellen drags Stoney to Markovs trailer where, begrudgingly, Stoney has a sit down meeting with Markov. Markov introduces Alex to Stoney and…in a bizarre turn of events. Stoney seems WAY more astounded that Alex can cook and sweep floors than the fact that MARKOV LITERALLY HAS A COHERENTLY CONVERSING CHIMP IN HIS POSSESSION. In either case Stoney snaps up the chance to put a magic,charismatic talking monkey on the bill and Alex and Markov are rebranded “Alexander the great & The Magnificent Markov!”

And with that we’re treated to an elongated magic act between Markov and Alex in which the monkey largely looks confused and terrified. In the audience of the opening show is a somewhat sinister looking man in a suit who, rather stoney faced, quietly makes notes on the show for its full duration. We’ll get back to him shortly but for now, the show was a success! And Stoney and his PR man David are dizzy at the possibilities Alex and Markov could open up for the carnival. They immediately begin working up a merch and branding campaign centred around the pair.

Markov meanwhile goes for a woodland walk when a fellow Carnie Kate asks if she can tag along for the trip. The pair introduce themselves and Kate shows a clear interest in Markov, who expresses that he isn’t really in the headspace for a relationship. He elaborates that he and Sara were married and expecting their first child together when a freak accident killed Sara and her unborn child, and because of that, he isn’t ready to start something new.

Meanwhile, ALEX STEALS A FUCKING CAR AND GOES ON A CRAZY CAR CHASE WITH A WOMAN IN THE BACK SEAT WHILE BEING CHASED BY THE COPS. in what is arguably one of the most bizarre scenes this film throws up, we spend almost 5-10 minutes racing around with Alex…and then that scene just…ends, and it’s never referenced or mentioned again. It’s like the film got hijacked briefly and then had to run a gaslighting campaign to convince you it DIDN’T just show an extended monkey car chase…

We get an extended heart to heart between Markov and Ellen about Ellen’s mum and Markovs dead wife, Alex breaks into Kate’s tent and steals her bra while she’s sleeping…hilarity ensues. and then we cut back to Kirk. who’s been hitting the booze pretty hard in light of Markov and Alex’s success. Because they’ve been doing so well, Stoneys been prioritising them over him and because of that he feels his influence over the carnival is weaning. That combined with his animals increasingly misbehaving for him has left him in a place where he’s beginning to have serious confidence issues and has hit the bottle to cope….KIDS FILM.

And it’s here we begin to get into our third act, as Stoney and David begin to kick into overdrive in the marketing of Alex and Markov and David works up the courage to ask Ellen out on a date. We get introduced once again to the mysterious suited man who made notes at Alex’s first show. This is Dr. Poole, a scientist interested in studying Alex as he believes him to be “The Missing Link” Markov refuses and from there the stakes go off the chart. As Poole shifts from “We want to study him for a few days” to “We’re going to vivisect him and harvest his organs if we so much as get a second alone with that damn dirty ape.” and he’s willing to go through nefarious means to do so.

In a…dumbfounding finale for lack of a better word…Will Dr. Poole Get his hands on Alex’s Monkey magic!? Will Dave and Ellen finally get it together!? And will Stoney manage to make enough cash to save the Carnival from closure!? All this and more will (probably) be answered if you check out “Carnival Magic”

And honestly; I know the words “Disorienting” and “wild” get thrown around a lot these days, but that’s the only way I can honestly describe this film. The actual plot is pretty simplistic, in essence it’s a bit of an E.T rip off…though this is a bit of interesting situation as the film was shot in 1980 and E.T didnt come out until 1982…so my guess is they didn’t INTEND to make an E.T knock off, but kind of…shaped it into something of an E.T knock off during its elongated post production session. In either case the end results really do feel almost dream like…like, if someone explained this film to you and you didn’t KNOW it existed. You’d swear it was someone misremembering something or making it up.

The script’s plot is pretty simple, this is basically a family drama comedy for most of the runtime with the kidnapping and rescue/adventure part of the film being relegated largely to the final act. But how we travel through this piece is positively ADHD driven. There’s a three act structure largely pinned by Markovs relationship with Kirk, with the opening act being Markov being sacked in favour of Kirk and Alex’s rise in the scene, the 2nd act being Kirks downfall and the rise of Markov and Alex and the 3rd act being Kirk’s full collapse and Markovs rescue attempt of Alex. but that basic plot is punctuated by a HELL of a lot of padding. Heart to hearts where similar information is exchanged over and over again, it’s one of the rare instances where the script feels like the writers want the characters to go one way and the CHARACTERS are almost disagreeing with the writers…which is bizarre.

The writers seemingly REALLY want Markov to date someone, whether it’s Kate or Ellen. But Markov flat out refuses and even by the end credits he doesn’t really end up going with anybody. Despite the film vying for it throughout the entire runtime. I mean, it’s an interesting approach to purposefully mislead your audience with themes that literally won’t be elaborated on beyond the 10-15 minutes they’re explored . But I don’t know if it’s conducive to a decent narrative spinner.

Given that this is a G-rated movie the film deals with a lot of themes that absolutely aren’t suitable for kids, or rather, themes that kids don’t really wanna deal with in a talking monkey carnival film. We see domestic abuse, complex talks about feelings of abandonment, gender dysphoria and comments on gender identity, there’s a scene where Kirk gets gorily mauled by a tiger, alcoholism and addiction, vivisection, depression, sexually inappropriate conversations and much more. And I’m not saying those themes can’t have their place in a kids film, they absolutely can if they’re handled with the appropriate level of maturity that a kids audience can digest without becoming confused/bored or upset.

But instead; Adamson’s Exploitation roots shine through here and it appears he just couldn’t keep himself from introducing, what by his standards were light exploitation elements, but by kids film standards would be almost like cutting to random clips from Salo. and when the film isn’t doing these kitchen sink serious heart to heart moments, its flip flopping DIRECTLY in the opposite direction with things like the MONKEY CAR CHASE, or a moment where its implied Alex molests a nurse, or at one point near the very end of the film there’s just a full blown street parade that happen for no real reason other than “We gotta end the film someway!”.

To me? Alex’s kidnapping happens way too late in the film, I’d have bought that forward to around halfway into the 2nd act leaving the 3rd act to set up the rescue attempt and all the drama around what happens when they find Alex with proper closure to Kirk, Alex, Ellen, David, Kim, Kate and Stoney’s plotlines. Because what happens here is the film introduces everyone, pissarses about for the entirety of the 2nd half of the first act and opening half of the second act. Then remembers it has to set up a kidnapping which it does near the very end of the 2nd act meaning the 3rd act is pretty much entirely bogged down by having to execute the kidnapping, THEN having to execute the rescue mission meaning that, by the time all’s said and done. There’s about 5 minutes to wrap everyone’s storylines up…not NEARLY enough time to do these characters any kind of justice.

Character development too goes to the wall here, the only character who really gets anything CLOSE to an arc is Ellen. Who starts the movie having to hide her femininity and across the runtime we see her open up about her feelings on wanting to be able to embrace that feminine lifestyle, she meets David and by the end of the picture she’s engaged, and fully out as the feminine lady she’s always wanted to be with full acceptance and reconciliation with her father. And y’know what? That one arc is decently handled. The rest of it’s bollocks. Barring Kirk, who goes from being a sober arsehole to being a drunk (and presumably arrested) arsehole. all the other characters pretty much end the film more or less where they started. Top end they may have started the film with a minor bug bear that…without any effort or challenge to the character is magically resolved by the end.

And the dialogues absolutely all over the place as well, I don’t believe that Alex’s lines for this were scripted. I think they assembled an edit and just got someone who was around in the dubbing facility to mumble and grumble whatever came to mind based on what was happening. In some cases there’s a disconnect between what Alex is saying and what’s actually happening on screen. Sometimes it’s subtle, but sometimes it’s a clear show that, whoever is dubbing this film has NO context as to what is actually happening in the scene.

The cast dialogue is awkward and repetitious, not a tremendous amount of plot progression is spoken about in the first 2 acts of this film. Points are just raised, reraised and re-re-raised with minor additional pieces of info bolted on each time. Some scenes have absolutely NO point other than to re-address earlier raised points and due to poor script structuring we find ourselves in scenarios (the introduction of Dr. Poole is the one that immediately springs to my mind) where they establish things, then forget about those established things for upwards of 20 minutes before coming back to it again and then having to re establish what they’ve already established because too much time has passed without them doing anything with the points they’ve tried to instigate. It kills time, but my god it’s exhausting.

All these elements combine together to create a script that should be straightforward and easy to execute, but instead ends up chronically going off message, has to repeatedly reintroduce and re-establish plot points BECAUSE it keeps going off the beat and path, is unevenly paced, has a BEYOND questionable tone behind it and introduced plotlines and imagery that I won’t forget anytime soon.

The script was written by Mark Weston, Bob Levine and Elvin Feltner. And if youuuuuu can believe it, this was their first and ONLY writing credits. And in the case of Bob and Elvin, this was the only thing they EVER did in the film industry. Mark on top of his writing credit managed to have 9 acting credits and rather ominously Carnival Magic was his last performance credit too. And, to be fair I could absolutely believe that someone would star in this film and then decide to never appear on film again.

The film was directed by Al Adamson, and…as mentioned he has an illustrious career in the exploitation and Sexploitation film genres with around 30(ish) directing credits under his belt and 7 writing credits. His work is often defined as some of the strangest and wildest movies in the history of cinema. Adamson would go on to direct one final film after this, “Lost” (Also known as Buddy & Skipper on it’s home video release) and the combination bombing of that film and Carnival Magic was enough to put Adamson out of the film business entirely, he went into working in real estate where he’d remain right up until his death in 1995 at the age of 66.

And on the direction front, while I know a lot of people take pot shots at Adamson for his less than stellar output, I think Carnival Magic is a corralled production. He’s able to use the elements he has available in a fairly complimentary way and his co-ordination of the various crews and cast, while maybe a bit chaotic, has at least produced something of a professional looking product. I have seen a LOT worse come out of this era of filmmaking. That being said, is it GOOD direction? No. No. no it is not. This isn’t a pretty film by any mark and while being able to mobilise and organise a cast and crew effectively IS the main job of a director. Being able to turn out a product that doesn’t look like arse is a close second. And while he HAS somewhat managed the former, it’s inescapable that the end product looks…for lack of a better word. Sweaty.

There’s a constant feeling of things being rushed, of some kind of madness happening off screen. Presumably because they had an old chimpanzee headbutting and starting knife fights with the crew members in between takes. But probably also because they were heavily limited on extras, heavily restricted on what they could and couldnt do while filming in an active and busy fun fair and slowly coming to the realisation that they’d written something that wouldnt be out of place in a David Lynch film that again, HAD A TARGET AUDIENCE OF SMALL CHILDREN.

Despite feeling like a snuff film charting a chimps last known whereabouts for most of the runtime. Adamson’s films always have a decent heart running under the surface and I’ll absolutely admit that some of the scenes between Markov, Kate and Ellen are absolutely wonderfully handled. Adamson really seemed to know how to get the best out of his cast, and even when the cast weren’t A-game amazing. He was still able to get them to a place where they could be managed. Which is a critical and important skill to have as a filmmaker. Even in this film’s worst looking parts, it still has heart. Which I think is what endeared me to it so much…well…that and the MONKEY CAR CHASE…WITH THE POLICE.

On the cine front, it’s ugly. As soon as the opening shots of the movie revved up my immediate first thought was that I’d accidentally loaded “She Freak” into my player. But no, and comparing this film to “She Freak” on the cine front is a bit of an insult because “She Freaks” cine was actually quite delightful…for 1967. “Carnival Magic” was shot some 13 years later and released 16 years later and it LOOKS like a late 60’s movie. Which is incredible because the leap in technological advancements not just in how we understand cinematography, but in the cameras and other tech we used between the late 60’s and early 1980’s was a revolution. A revolution that seemingly passed Al Adamson by. Shots are flat, lifeless, there’s maybe a handful of shots of the carnival that look passably good. But the vast majority of sequences are shot for necessity rather than form. They’re minimally constructed with little variety and barely any consideration for composition.

While some day for night footage is handled somewhat amicably. Most of the lighting is shot to be as broad and plain as possible, I don’t know if they originally planned to do something stylised with the flat profile they shot in, but I’d be lying if I said this film didn’t look and feel like it came from another age than the one it was made in. The editor in me was captivated by it, but if you’re used to pixel perfect mainstream cinematography or you’re one of those weirdos who picks up on continuity issues and holds it up as an example of how shit the studios are for not even being able to create a totally faultless unique experience. You are probably going to have a nervous breakdown over this movie.

Performance wise, I mean…Trudi the chimp…when not attacking the cast and crew is decidedly charming as Alex. though if you ever want a movie to highlight why regulations on animals working in films need to be as tight as possible. This is the film to show that. In the 80’s people probably wouldn’t have batted an eye. But by modern standards there were several scenes where I winced as she gets chained up and is clearly distressed by large numbers of people making noise. It’s…a product of its time…and it’s not okay.

Don Stewart as Markov is probably the best performer here, given he’s being asked to work with a script that could best be described as “Madlibs” he gives a very decent performance, delivering his lines with quiet sincerity and when he needs to play deep, he really hits the notes required. It’s a shame the rest of the film undercuts that with stuff like A CHIMP CAR CHASE SCENE. But he does a decent job and really shines. My only criticism is his physical presence is a little underplayed here. He’s supposed to be Markov the Magnificent and while he’s fine in his “off stage” persona. It maybe would have been nice to see his ON stage persona have a bit more of the copperfield “razzle dazzle”.

Jennifer Houlton is wonderful here as Ellen really delivering on what the script gives her and going above and beyond in showcasing her transition from wallflower who’s afraid to be who she really is, to fully blossomed woman. Her relationship with David is somewhat rushed (the film umms and ahhs with what to do with them for most of the first and 2nd acts, before putting them together around the midpoint of act 2. They date for what seems like an eternity even though it’s only really a few days in film, and then they’re suddenly engaged…Its a bit hectic) but on the whole, she does a more than decent and convincing job here and I was astounded to find out that this was her last acting role after only 3 credits.

The rest of the cast are decent enough, Joe Cirillo has a decent turn as Kirk, absolutely bringing weight and passion where required to a role that relied on it to carry the performance. He does a decent job and it’s just such a shame the film got so hung up on countryside walks with Ellen and David that it actually forgot to bother to make him a bit more of a focal point. It would have been nice to see him lose his cool or make a few more mistakes more consistently throughout the film to help make the transition from lead act of the carnival to drunk on his final warning a bit smoother. As it stands he basically goes from leading the carnival, to being a bit worried about his place, to ONE scene where it’s implied he’s getting sloppy, to full blown drunk willing to get into Chimp thievery to make ends meet. ALL OF THIS unfolds across only a few days in film. It’s not explicitly stated how much time passes. But given it’s the summer season and it’s well underway at the time the film starts, the whole movie can’t unfold in any longer than a 3 week window.

And finally; the soundtrack; and what we have here is one of the most demented scores I’ve heard for a movie. It’s mostly synthy minimalist attempts at circus music. But it’s not done particularly well. As a result, it sounds less like a score that’s been written for a professional production and more like some randomer was offered a couple of bottles of wild turkey to bash out music for whatever Al needed to have bashed out. Circus music at the best of times has a bit of demented edge to it, but badly played bizarrely paced entirely synth keyboard generated circus music is a whole other level of “What on EARTH am I watching!?” for some reason most of the sound effects in this movie are also sourced from video games including Centipede and Galaga. It’s just…wild.

There are several rumours around what happened to Carnival Magic. As mentioned earlier it was produced with the aim of solely playing at children’s matinee shows, but beyond that there were no plans for a home release and once it had finished its theatrical run, it pretty much disappeared off the face of the earth. For the longest time there were anecdotes that the film was “illegally” screened as backing footage for several punk bands during some illegal gigs at a regional abandoned indie cinema. The interesting point being that the people ATTENDING the gig stopped listening to the music and instead started watching the crazy talking chimp movie.

The film remained the stuff of legends and was considered lost until the mid to late 2000’s when members of AGFA were asked if they were interested in a complete set of reels for the film that had been rescued from a cupboard of that very same abandoned theatre. AGFA transferred and restored the film where it received a premier on TCM, much to the bewilderment of audience members. It was then followed up with an appearance on the revived MST3K where it established and grew an even larger cult following. The film was eventually licensed out to Severin Films as part of their Al Adamson masterpiece collection blu ray box set released in June 2020. It also received a solo DVD release from Severin at the same time.

Both are now considered “Out of print” with the solo DVD slowly creeping up in price (honestly, if you want a copy get one now because it will go crazy VERY soon if it hasn’t already) and the Adamson box set, at the time of recording going for frankly obscene money, and having contacted Sevrin enquiring about any chances of a potential reissue, I was politely told “No.” At the time they initially put it out I couldn’t afford it, and boy do I regret it… I’d very much like to explore Adamsons work in more detail because…after seeing THIS. I have a LOT more questions than answers.

Carnival magic feels like a made up movie. And I think, realistically, 1983 was probably the last time you could get away with making a film so blatantly cheap, bizarre and bordering on having the ASPCA and PETA raiding your set. It’s a cacophonous experience that I’d LOVE to see play out in an actual cinema sometime. If you have children, show them this movie. Let me know what they made of it, the younger the better. I’m genuinely intrigued to see what they’d make of this…assault on the senses. With an all over the place script, ugly cine, controversial themes, direction that’s off the mark and a soundtrack that could score a Five nights at freddy’s game. I can only wholeheartedly recommend “Carnival Magic” dim the lights, grab a snack and let the 85 minute long Monkey based surrealism wash over you like so much hot vomit. Recommended.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/carnival-magic/1/

*Sigh* Best of the Best 4: Without Warning. Y’know…when I started this franchise I was so bright eyed and hopeful. The first film was a decently made and interesting Team sports movie, it wasnt perfect, but it felt fresh, interesting, fun. The sequel drifted away from the sports theming somewhat, embracing a more martial arts/action drama vibe, but it still worked, it was still watchable!…I barely made it through Best of the best 3…

And so, we arrive at Best of the Best 4…a film that…well, to me its at least a BIT better than 3. But it seems to have swapped active irritation for…just, numbness.

So as a cards on the table moment here, I honestly don’t know how to feel about the script for this thing, the last film gave me strong feelings of gutteral hatred towards it, I was frustrated with it’s structure. It’s weird “power scaling” of Tommy, it’s choice to portray the racists the way they did, the whole thing felt annoying to me. This film? Its probably one of the most bland and generic scripts I’ve sat through in a LONG time. And the handful of moments that did invoke a feeling from me, were largely negative. I don’t know honestly whats worse, feeling a strong dislike towards something, or a peevish total non interest because of how bland and uninteresting the thing is.

Philip Rhee when interviewed about the film commented that he basically only took the job of writing and directing this picture because the Weinsteins offered him a TON of money to do it. And that in hindsight he regretted making this. I can honestly see why, What we have here is 90 minutes of flatly paced, rigidly 3 act structured, bland story telling that amounts basically to a runaround between Tommy and a group of Slavic gangsters trying to recover a microdisc. A dated plotline for 1990 let alone 1998, at that point this kind of story telling was positively ancient.

Tommys character here has been almost completely whittled away to nothing, he’s gone from being an emotional powerhouse, who’s nice until it’s time not to be nice with an underplayed charismatic streak, to being just an emotionless slab who only gets angry when the script remembers he has things to be angry about. At no point does it feel like he actually genuinely cares about the seriousness of the situation. The gangsters are also equally bland and generic with only Yuri, the little brother of the head of the operation getting ANYTHING resembling a character profile that isnt just “They’re nefarious Russian sorts.”

The script introduces plot points as if they’re going to be important and then never really addresses them. They give Tommy a dead wife who’s only function seemingly is to act as a mcguffin to force Tommy to bake a cake for his daughter (seriously.) They bring in a friendly shopkeeper who Tommys known for years, just to act a a mcguffin to get the microdisc to Tommy, then they kill both him AND his daughter off for literally no reason. At one point, Tommy gets “Drugged” by one of the agents working for the russians who Tommy *Thinks* is a good guy, they imply briefly some flirtation, maybe even the startings of a relationship, which got me thinking she may change sides in the 3rd act…but NOPE, they drug him (including a weird trippy drug scene which again, comes out of nowhere and doesnt add anything to the main plot) and then seemingly they forget they ever raised the romantic implications, just having her be a generic baddy for the rest of the movie.

That same woman is then also tied into a *hinted at* relationship with Yuri. Which is never really developed either beyond two scenes, one in which he *presumably* shags her in the traffic control room near the beginning of the film and one near the end of the film where she walks in on him having a threesome with some russian fluesies. Neither of which are elaborated on I might add…, and in the final act when she gets killed in one of the STUPIDEST ways i’ve seen in a movie like this for a while. Yuri gives not one fuck. It’s hard enough to get an audience to emotionally invest in your characters when you’re actually trying. It’s impossible to do that if you don’t even care what your characters think of each other.

The whole thing seems to swing violently between not knowing if it wants to be a gritty and serious action thriller, or whether to throw a bit of hammy OTTness in there, and it tries both and ends up achieving neither, it’s flashy, but the stupid moments undercut the gritty realness, it’s hammy, but the gratuitous gore (more on that later) means it cant really hit that sweetspot of silliness that these kind of films can do so well.

My personal biggest gripe is how they decide to end the movie (im spoiling this, I don’t care.)…with the baddies on a plane full of stolen money speeding down the runway, all but guarenteed to getaway, Tommy grabs the bomb with only 4 minutes on the clock, hops into a fire engine and speeds off down the runway after them. Not only is that fire engine able to OUTRUN a SPEEDING AEROPLANE on the midst of takeoff. But Tommy has enough time to speed past it by SUCH a magin, that he’s able to get out, get onto the fire engines cherry picker, extend the picker to it’s highest setting. AND have enough time to figure out the PRECISE strength, angle and height he’ll need to throw the bomb to get it to land inside a cavety where the planes landing gear is EXACTLY at the point that the baddies pull the landing gear up, and in just enough time for the bomb to go off JUST as they’re flying over a beach.

When that happened on my initial watch I literally verbally shouted “Oh FUCK OFF!” what an absolute load of bollocks this film tries to shove off onto its audience it’s honestly quite unbelievable. And frankly one of the worst endings to any of the films in this franchise. I mean, say what you will about Best of the best 3, at least the ending could have THEORETICALLY happened.

It’s not all bad, theres a decent bike chase scene in the 3rd act that impressed and had some decent explosions, theres a decent fight scene at the gangsters house where Tommy stumbles in on a group of the Slavics wounded henchmen recuperating from a previous Tommy attack, leading to an extended fight in which bandaged and poorly henchmen Tommy has already taken out, get beaten up again but this time with sticks. But outside of that…this things just a totally forgettable slog honestly.

Even the dialogue isnt all that interesting, theres no real quips, no memorable exchanges, anything notable here is really more in the delivery and what lines have been written are stilted, overly wordy and only really serve to try and push the film to 90 minutes rather than giving the plot any kind of meaningful progression or bounce.. It’s just such a dull experience to make it through. 90% of the movie is Tommy wandering around a city calling people, and the rest is the Russians sending people after Tommy, who takes them out with no effort. Thats literally the whole movie, barring the fucking plane bollocks.

On the Direction front, it’s professional. It looks like how a studio grade movie should look. and thats. It. and it barely manages to achieve that. I cannot stress how little interest it seems Rhee had here in delivering anything other than the bare minimum. yes , it does look better than a lot of the lower end offerings of this decade, yes, its still very impressive to be able to successfully pull together all of the elements that make a studio grade movie look and work to the standard they look and work as. But it never breaks above that, it never aims to be any better than “it’s good enough that the studio can put it out legitimately without having to hush it away”

Now, some nice things that come with a slightly higher budget and studio backing is that the stunt sequences are a lot higher quality than previous entries, as mentioned theres a bike chase scene that gets pretty explosive and immersive that I quite enjoyed, and because they have more money to play with, it also means that the film can afford to be more gratuitous than previous entries. Which means in this film you get to see people get shot in the head in all it’s explosive pulpy gory glory and people get their arms broken by bending them in directions they’re not supposed to bend in, which again, did catch the eye and DID give the impression that the film was working with a bit more money than it was previously used to.

The problem? Is that those kind of gore shots wern’t really in tone with the other best of the best movies that have never really “gone” there before. Couple that with the fact that those kind of shots only happen a couple of times across the whole runtime and you end up with something that does feel out of place and tone with not only this movie, but the rest of the series. I mean, this is a film where in a 10 minute window, Tommy has a heart to heart with his 5 year old daughter about how they’re going to make a birthday cake together and have an awesome birthday party which then breaks into clowning around shenanigans, only THEN, 5 minutes later, to cut to a cop having the inside of his skull examined by a shotgun blast. It’s just. a bit tonally uneven.

Even the fight choreography isnt all that great here, we’ve gone from slow motion close ups of sweaty men trying to prove they’re the best of the best, to just, ultra generic masked shot fights with little to no soft contact connections and a lazy edit job to hide the hits and kicks even more. Almost no efforts gone into the choreography, theres maybe 2 fight scenes in the whole film that are even vaguely worth paying attention to, and even they’re just passable. I dunno, its just, kind of sad to see someone who’s so passionate about martial arts as a medium half arse the emotive draw these fights can have just to get it done and in the can.

On the plus side, one thing I can say is Phillips handling of direction of the cast is ever improving, here cast members use props, move around the set space utilising it well and they seem to have worked closely with Phillip to get their deliveries down. Their performances may vary, but at least how they deliver their lines is solid. So thats something I guess…

For me? The cines fine. Just about, composition is solid, theres a good variety of shots making up sequences and the edits are actually pretty tight on some of the more action oriented chase scenes with good utilisation of the footage shot. I kind of liked it and thought they even handled some of the effects shots pretty nicely. It’s not great, in fact it’s just kind of “Unremarkably” acceptable. In fact, the only thing I kind of didnt like so much about this one was the lighting choices, which just seemed a little…off.

Nothings particularly underlit, they just do some weird stuff with the lighting, like coloured gels in Tommys apartment, a total lack of controlled lighting on location scenes, which just leaves things looking a bit washed out and bland. There’s chiaroscuro implemented in places that don’t really need it, and in places that really WOULD have benefitted from chiaroscuro they just went for flat lighting that doesn’t really do anything other than show our cast moving about. Its a real shame honestly because I think the cine is probably this films strongest element, and they’ve kind of fumbled it a bit in the one place that could have taken it from good, to great.

Performance wise, their are two noteworthy performances here, one is Earnie Hudson playing Detective Gresko, a role that absolutely caught me off guard because, Hudsons largely known for playful, charismatic and sarcastic roles but here, he’s playing out of type as an abrasive, aggressive and no nonsense detective who’s a bit of a dick to everyone he comes into contact with, and over the course of the film as he falls into the circumstances that play out, he softens up, ending the film in a more typical role. I loved him in this and find it astounding that noone else has given him roles like this since, because I think he absolutely aces the part and genuinely brings some of the best moments of the film to the surface with his portrayal. He’s fab.

The other is Thure Riefenstein as Yuri Slava, who brings a MORE than unhinged menace to proceedings and arguably has some of the best screentime in this thing. Hes animated, grandiose, a little bit hamtastic, think Boris in Goldeneye and your not a million miles from home. He puts 50 thousand volts up this production like you wouldnt believe, it’d honestly be a poorer offering without him.

The rest of the cast are on autopilot, with Rhee himself as Tommy bringing a VERY disappointing turn to proceedings, he struggles through the script, gives almost non of the energy or passion he did in previous entries and at times gives readings that feel like he’s barely even remembered his own script. It was very underwhelming, and while the supporting cast members bring just about acceptable performances to the table, they’re so underwritten and lacking character development, that you might as well have 6-10 balloons with faces scribbled on for all the interest they actually PUT into the role, it’s terribly disappointing honestly…

And finally; The Soundtrack. Its nothing special, thats probably about all I can say on it honestly, its stocky, generic 90s action movie fodder, if you’ve seen pretty much ANY action movie 1989 to 2001, you’ve heard tracks similar to whats presented here. And it only goes to further punctuate the total “BLEH” that this film is. GOD I wish I’d brought booze with me for this review…

Best of the Best 4 was released in the UK as a big box rental tape in 1998 and was distributed by CIC on behalf of Paramount. It received a DVD release in 2008 courtesy of 4Digital media before finally getting the bluray treatment in 2016 by 4digital as well, though it didnt end up getting a solo release (for obvious reasons) so…the only way of owning a HD release of this is by buying “The complete Best of the Best Boxset” compiling all 4 films together…which…now i’ve seen them all, ima take a rain check there. Picture quality is decent enough, they’ve remastered it rather solidly. Though extras are a little thin on the ground. Still…it’s best of the best 4…what do you expect!?

In summary, UGGGHHHHH. Its SO by the numbers its painful, if you’ve gotten to a point in your life where your watching “Best of the best 4” as a means of escapism and you think thats acceptable? I’d maybe go reach out to a neighbour or local librarian. Im sure they’ll be able to get you the help you need.

And with that! We’ve finally put to rest, Best of the Best and answered the age old question, was this franchise the best of the best…no. No it bloody well wasnt…Till next time.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/best-of-the-best-4-without-warning/1/

1980’s “Scared to Death” is a movie that i’ve kind of inadvertently ended up covering, last year a regular viewer recommended checking out a film called “SynGenOr” because they said it would suit the tone of this channel down to the ground. So I looked it up and found that it was actually kinda sorta loosely connected to todays movie. And what I mean by that is that, SynGenOr basically WANTED to be a sequel to “Scared to Death” but because “Scared to Death” at that time was SO obscure and low budget, they didnt want to run the risk of ostracising potential audiences by tying it to a forgotten movie made 10 years prior that was out of circulation. As such, I kind of felt like it made sense to cover “Scared to Death” BEFORE SynGenOr because…while they’re largely unconnected, I am nothing if not a bit of a completionist and I like to try and do these things properly.

So! Scared to Death! A movie that damn near bankrupt director and writer William Malone, im not kidding the film cost $74k to produce and he ended up selling everything he owned including his car to get it made. So, with SO much on the line, you’d think that this HAD to be something incredible right? Well…

Scared to Death follows the misadventures of “Ted” and as the film opens, Teds just quit his job as a detective to pursue a career in writing (with maybe a lil freelance detective work on the downlow) As he’s leaving the station however he backs out into the car of a lady called Jennifer. Ted tries to leave the scene but Jennifer is adamant he needs to stay because the cars a “vintage” and she wants the police to document the hit. After some backing and forthing that gets a bit surreal, Ted gives Jennifer a business card with his new office address and phone number and tells her to reach out to him there.

Which she does, she says theres at LEAST $1200 of damages to her car, and without missing a beat Ted heads into a back room and returns with an envelope containing $2000 which he tells her to keep. This changes the tone of the relationship immediately and the pair soon warm up to each, Ted even goes so far as to ask Jennifer out, which she politely declines, but is flattered all the same.

And it’s while this is going on that the main thrust of the film begins to take shape as a mysterious person or “Being” has been stalking the streets of L.A attacking anyone it can find, leaving them either dead or comatose. At the time we join the film we see the creature claim its 10th and 11th victims in relatively quick succession with the police currently hot on the case. Overseeing this is a chap called “Lou” who’s good friends with “Ted” and over a game of chess, the pair briefly discuss the case before Lou has to head back to work.
We then pick back up with Jennifer, returning home from the grocery store. When she arrives at her house, Ted appears to have left her a handwritten note apologising once again for the incident and leaves her a big bunch of flowers. Jennifer’s charmed and heads back over to Teds place to leave a note of her own saying that she’s reconsidered Teds offer and would love to go for dinner some time.

Which they do! Later that evening Jennifer arrives at Teds offices and the pair decide to head back to Jens house for a couple of streaks before engaging in little * bouncy bouncy* and while THATS going on, we then cut to two sanitation workers who’ve been asked to do some investigative work in a nearby sewer system. One of the pair heads down only to come face to face with a colossal creature! He very quickly gets the old “Lights out, falling down with the no breathing and the hammana hammana to the chest” his co-worker becomes impatient that this guys been down their for so long and decides to head down there himself to see what the fuss is, but before he’s even made it halfway down the ladder, the creature tries coming for him too, ultimately getting dragged down into the sewer to his demise. The next day, Teds and Jennifer are now seemingly working together…for some reason…when Lou drops by to update him on the murders and, in doing so, he tries to subtly ask if Ted’ll come back to the force to help them figure out whats going on. Ted flat out refuses, but does offer to be something of a sounding board if Lou needs to vent.

Once again the creature strikes! This time attacking a group of teens roller skating around a multi story car park, with the only survivor of the attacks being left in a state of sheer shock and rendered mute. Lou and the team begin to investigate the scene, when Ted shows up out of the blue. He randomly kicks off at his old boss who tries to get him kicked out, and Lou has to take him to one side to calm him down and try to update him in a VERY coded way about what’s happened here. Jennifer’s also at the scene and says that she’s head from a lady called Sherry who’s reluctant to talk to the cops, but has information that might be beneficial to the case that she’ll only share with people who will give her a chance.

Jenn heads over to the rendezvous point to meet Sherry, but sherrys late for the meeting. Jennifer wanders around the rendezvous spot and accidentally meets the creature who attacks her on site! Ted gets a call from Lou informing him that Jennifers in a coma at the hospital after having an epileptic seizure from what they think is a brain tumour. Ted races to the hospital only to have what Lou said confirmed and that Jennifer cant be seen at this time..

Ted heads back to the office and immediately goes to hit the bottle, but Lou arrives just in time to talk him out of it. Around this time Sherry makes it to the office and asks if Ted and Lou will hear her out, The pair are somewhat reluctant, but at this point they’ll take anything if it helps get the case back on track. Sherry explains that she was a college graduate who worked under a Dr. Amberdean, a geneticist who’s main project was an attempt to develop a new lifeform. And; he succeeded, creating a dangerous creature that survived by drinking Spinal fluid, the doctor was convinced that, should the creature reach maturity, it would pose a serious risk to human life. Unfortunately; he died of a heart attack before the creature could be killed and the last documented notes on the creature are unclear as to it’s status..

The reason Sherry brings this up? Well..one of the side effects of the method with which the creature drains it’s victims spinal fluid is that it can make the victim appear as if they’ve had an epileptic seizure or have symptoms in line with having a brain tumour. Ted and Lou cant quite believe what they’re hearing, but they ask if Sherry knows of any way to kill the creature and all she can tell them is that she has copies of all the notes made while working with Dr. Amberdean back at her lab, in the meantime Lou goes to confirm with the coroner if all the victims have low spinal fluid levels and symptoms in line with seizures or brain tumours…which they do.

Armed with this information, they just need to figure out how the creature is able to move around the city undetected. But just as they’re gearing up, news comes from the higher ups saying the case has been closed down, likely because they want to silence any public panic. Unswayed Ted and Lou decide to investigate solo and thus we enter the final act! As Sherry finds her notes and a creature in the process, Will The gang manage to stop the SynGenOr? Will Jennifer wake up from her coma!? And when the gang find out that the SynGenOr can reproduce A-sexually, will they manage to stop a wave of creatures from enveloping the L.A streets!? All this and more will be answered if you check out, Scared to Death.

And what a conflicting movie I’ve been given to talk about today. Frustrating is probably the best word to describe it, because I really want to like this thing, I really do. But it doesnt half go about doing things that really put a strain on my feelings towards it. Chief amongst the reasons is the script itself. Which is just…problematic. For a starters, it’s a script of two halves quality wise, with the opening of the film being actually quite dry and repetitious, basically the first 30-50 minutes of this thing could best be described as “Ted does some wisecracking with Jennifer or Lou, and occasionally we see “The creature” stalk and kill some women, but without actually showing the kill on screen” it’s neat enough when it’s first established, but as it starts rowing through the motions again and again it quickly becomes apparent that they’re stalling for time, Which left me impatiently clock watching.

But! From around the time of the roller skate murders, the film DOES pick up a bit and the 2nd half, in my opinion gets enough momentum under it’s belt to deliver an interesting story that does have some nice twists and turns. I just wish they’d spread that out a bit more into the opening half. Equally not helping matters are the massive plot holes and conveniences this film has that either don’t get resolved or are just forgotten about. Jennifer is set up as a main character for this film but around 50 minutes in she gets attacked by the creature and disappears for the rest of the movie, only turning up at the very VERY end of the film for a jumpscare that did NOT win any favours with me, and we never actually get any kind of resolution for her. They just kind of go “Oh! She woke up from the coma btw!” completely missing that the point of announcing that, generally, is for some kind of express purpose, even if it’s just a reunion with Ted.

Instead we get half a film with Jennifer and half a film with Sherry, and it’s hard not to look at Sherrys involvement in the film and not think it was done out of convenience because the actress playing Jennifer either couldnt or didnt want to appear in the rest of the movie. Teds connections to the police force are referenced heavily, but never really followed up on, theres no resolution there, nor is there any resolution on the police randomly deciding to close the case. The way its inserted into the script kind of implies the police are in on the SynGenOr being a thing and that maybe they’re having some involvement in it’s attacks. But…nope. They just say the police are closing the case and it never gets referenced or bought up again.

It’s ability to reproduce A-sexually also isn’t really played out to its fullest potential either. They mention its something the SynGenOr can do, literal MOMENTS before they find a massive clutch of baby SynGenOrs (which they then promptly kill) and then that aspect of things doesnt really get bought up again. I know its a standard trope of these kind of films…y’know? The whole “You killed it! But it had a baby!” line is as old as the 40’s and 50’s in terms of sequel bait. But here? It’s so half hearted. They really don’t try to integrate it into the plot at all. Quite literally they have 1 shot where they say its a thing, 1 scene where they destroy a load of baby SynGenOrs and one POV shot implying theres more than one SynGenOr at the end. And thats the whole involvement of that plot element…all within the last 10-15 minutes I might add….

The film draws heavy inspiration from two, at the time, recent horror films “Halloween” and “Alien” and there are references to both LITTERED through this thing. With some of them bordering on letigeously similar, such as the POV shots of the creature wandering around the suburbs peeking into windows, or shots of some of the victims being “gooed” up onto the wall as a source of food for the creature and it’s offspring. I mean, theres Homaging, and then theres flat out stealing, and this film quite regularly gets PAINFULLY close to crossing that line. Regular viewers will know my distaste for films that cite more mainstream features in their movies. And while nicking some of the scenarios and cine here is a BIT better than just flat out having the characters say “Oh! Have you seen the movie Alien!? Well this creatures reminding me EXACTLY of the alien from that movie with the Alien called “Alien” it’s still not a great look.

Pacing here is a bit iffy too, with an opening half thats a SUPER slow burner that drags on setting up it’s characters, scenarios and situations, before swapping to a near breakneck 2nd half where we’re thrown a million pieces of exposition at once and because theres no time to develop those ideas, it results in the inconsistencies and plot holes mentioned previously. The three act structure isn’t as solid as i’d like it to be, the first act is pretty hard defined as is the third act. But placing where the 2nd act begins and ends is somewhat tricky. Theres no clear shift in tone, theres no moment where you can clearly see the film bed in. the 2nd act of this film feels exactly the same as the first act of the film, just with a few more creature appearances. Thats not good because you need that clear distinction between your acts in order to subconsciously tell the audience where the films up to.

A good first act establishes the characters, introduces the core scenario and moves the characters into a position where that core scenario is going to impact them in some way, the 2nd act then shows the characters engaging in that scenario while developing their personalities and even potentially establishing a character arc, unless your characters are Beavis and Butthead, it’s important that your film gives your characters purpose and growth so that they end the film in a different position to how they started. Usually either a significantly better or worse place which is usually established in the 3rd act where our characters, having engaged in the situation, are then set up with a finale that resolves the situation, or resolves their character arc. Possibly teasing more in future if there’s interest or scope to do so.

This films 2nd act meanders as it doesn’t know what to do with it’s core cast. It would have probably made more sense to introduce Sherry’s thread earlier at the beginning of the 2nd act rather than the end of it. In doing so they could have set up the SynGenOr a bit better without having to rush out all the crucial information in an exposition dump in the 3rd act AND they could have slow cooked that “corrupt police” angle a little bit more and possibly played them better into the 3rd act, which would have tied more stuff off and led to a more satisfying resolution. Instead they just kind of elongate the opening act, but quicker and a bit more violently. So we get 4 attacks instead of 2 and not a whole lot of plot development right up until the end of the Act when Sherry finally becomes a key point of the plot. Which leaves things a bit lumpy and uneven in my opinion.

The dialogue dances a VERY fine line as well, in places (particularly Teds dialogue) it’s charismatic, fluid and feels really solid, it kind of reminded me of the dialogue in “The Stuff” in the sense that it’s long flowing almost Woody Allen esq monologues that are peppered with sarcasm. But outside of those occasional glimmers, whats here is rough. A lot of it is exposition dumps, and not very well handled exposition dumps at that, most of the rest is stilted and fairly bland dialogue that fits the bill of B-movie horror perfectly well, but that in many ways is the problem. They clearly know how to write interesting dialogue because Ted and Lous pieces are both fairly solid. I have NO idea why they decided to put so little interest into the rest of the cast’s pieces. It’s baffling honestly.

The script was Co-written and Directed by William Malone, he has 18 directing credits and 6 writing credits in a career spanning 29 years, highlights include TV contributions towards “Tales from the Crypt” and the 1999 remake of “House on Haunted Hill” with his best know writing credit likely to be “Universal Soldier: The Return” His last credit was in 2008, and he hasnt been seen since. Also on Co-writing duties we have Robert Short, he has 5 writing credits, this was his first and i’d say probably his best known of the five with his last one in 2002. He’s mainly known for his work in visual effects, of which he has 23 credits with highlights including “Star trek: the motion picture” and the reboot movie of “The Man from U.N.C.L.E”

And on the direction front…well, there honestly isnt a lot to say, generally when judging a films direction, your looking both at how the director was able to manage the production in order to deliver a coherent product, AND for bonus points how the director was able to produce a work that leaves their mark on the picture. An identifier that says “This is a work of THIS director specifically” what we have here from a direction standpoint however is a film thats predominantly lifting shot types and scenes from Alien and Halloween, and whats left outside of that is at best “acceptable” if not a touch bland.

I can understand why the direction here is played so safe. Malone sold his life effectively to get this movie made, and he specifically chose to make a horror movie because he knew it was a fairly safe bet and that you could generally make something that looked good with very little budget. That coupled with the fact he previously had work in producing halloween masks for a company meant he could keep costs low on getting the main monster costume produced because… he just made it himself.

The guy put a lot on the line and wanted a safe return, so it’s understandable that the direction here would predominantly be cribbed from successful films of the last 2-5 years and whatever looked about right to put the key messages of the film across…I get that. But it doesn’t ultimately lead to an end product that I can really praise. It’s effectively cheating off someone else’s homework, and while that’s fine if you don’t get caught. If you do, it’s problematic. So in terms of creating a distinct vision it’s a big thumbs down from me.

Direction of the cast does fair a bit better, the cast are responsive, move around their set spaces decently enough and utilise props effectively, but there are plenty of points in this thing where it feels less like the director wanted to show the BEST of the cast on screen, and more like they just wanted the take. Which is understandable, but not a great viewing experience. The results….aaaaare about as interesting as you could imagine. Which again, does nothing to help really sell the film to audiences and leaves things rather lifeless for large chunks of the runtime unfortunately.

What I can say is the cine is probably the best part of this film, YES a lot of shots are stolen from other movies, but the composition in those shots can’t be faulted. In places, the lighting and use of Chiaroscuro is phenomenal for the budget. Honestly, given the money they were working with i’m amazed the thing looks half as good as it does and the only negative criticism I have about the movie is the flat profile some shots work with during the longer exposition scenes, it would have been nicer to either add a little more to the depth of field in those shots, or used more cuts to help at least make them a bit more engaging to the audience.

The only other thing I picked up on is an age old problem of movies from this era, and thats that quite a few of the night shots are massively underexposed, meaning we as an audience are effectively drenched in darkness with no idea what we’re ACTUALLY supposed to be looking at. Theres a blatant example of it at the beginning of the movie, but as the film goes on and the lighting gets more visually interesting it does pop up from time to time as a bit of a problem as the dimly lit sewer sets become increasingly frustrating to make out.

Performance wise, there are two stars of this thing really and that’s John Stinson as Ted and David Moses as Lou, the pair are constantly charismatic, have some of the best lines in the film and always try to keep animated and high energy throughout the production. They have phenomenal chemistry together and are probably the 2nd best thing about this film outside of the cine. Positively solid performances and totally memorable!

Unfortunately the same cannot be said for the rest of the cast, Toni Jannotta and Diana Davidson try amicably to match the energy of their on screen counterparts as Jennifer and Sherry respectively, but neither get enough time to fully bed into the roles before they’re pulled away from us. They’re notable, just. The rest of the supporting cast drop below even that and are just SO bland. Don’t even get me started they’re cookie cutter extras who are there to look a bit scared, do their screamy bit and maybe talk to the main cast for a couple of lines, they’re totally unremarkable for this genre and it’s a real shame as its stuff like that that helps lift a mediocre film into a great one.

And finally; the soundtrack. Which is actually surprisingly solid as well! It’s an experimentally synthy piece that suits the tone of the film perfectly, it sets the tone and mood which results in even some of the more inane shots being given just a bit more of a sinister edge. Its a good solid work that stands out (which is odd given the film’s dedication to conformity within the genre) and one that, while I wouldn’t want to listen to in isolation, I absolutely enjoyed as part of this film.

Scared to death was released in 1980 and Malones first distribution sale not only managed to pay off the costs of the film but netted him a tidy profit when he agreed a play deal with Malasia for $90k. It struggled initially to find distribution in the states before the rights eventually landed with “Lone Star Pictures” who distributed the movie to most drive ins across the US (Something Malone was unaware of when he attended the premier in texas expecting a proper theatrical experience and effectively arrived in a back lot wearing a tuxedo).

It would arrive on UK shores in 1981 and was passed uncut in may of that year, later receiving a VHS release by Avatar in late 1981, unaffected by the 1984 video recordings act it remained in circulation until it finally received a DVD release also by Avatar in 2002 which is the copy i’ve used. It’s rough on the Picture quality and the sound quality is up and down as well sounding hissy and tinny. The only extras to speak of are a trailer and an interactive menu with scene select so, it’s quite the budget release. Luckily! In 2022 Vinegar syndrome re-released the film with a ground up remaster on bluray and it looks delightful fixing almost all picture and sound quality issues with the previous release. While it isnt perfect, it’s the best this films likely to look AND it has a making of, location tour and a new cut of the film that supposedly tightens it up a bit alongside a couple of other extras to help sweeten the deal, which works for me!

I Think had I paid the $30+ it would have cost to import the Vinegar Syndrome version of this film over to the Uk I’d have probably been harsher on it. At that price point i’d have considered myself robbed for this film. But the version I ended up picking up cost me £3 and for that, I feel I can be a lot nicer about it. Its far from perfect, with an opening that was slowburn, decent cine and direction that’s been screwed over by a dry and repetitive script, and a second half that finally allowed the script to come into its own, but left the direction and cine high and dry after such a promising opening. Nice lighting, some decent performances and a good soundtrack help to just about get this movie over the line in my opinion, but ultimately this was a feature I could have taken or left. I’m more than curious to see what the new Directors cut offers in terms of tightening the film up a bit, but it’ll be a while before I go back to this one to check it out. I’m not gonna say avoid this one. But I wouldn’t say it was a priority watch.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/scared-to-death-1980/1/

So it’s come to this 1987’s Miami Connection, a film that, in a tale as old as time was an obscure action picture with a crazy background that bombed at the boxoffice and was considered lost for years, but then got rediscovered and re-established as a cult classic for audiences to fawn over, going even so far as to have had a luxury TRIPLE disc 4k bluray release in recent years… A collaborative effort between director Woo Sang Park and Y.K. Kim the story goes that the pair bashed out Miami Connection (predominantly shot and ACTUALLY based in Orlando Florida…go figure) in a flurry of inspiration driven creativity. Y.K Kim was a somewhat famous martial artist in the Florida area with a string of successful Tai-kwon-do studios, in fact he was so loved that when the idea of a film came up, the local government in Florida at the time basically gave him full access to the city, to shoot in any public space without the requirement of a permit.

And so! With a script that appears to have largely been written in binge sessions and carte blanche to shoot where they like, the pair got to work! With Kim bringing in students from his Dojo to play most of the main cast members and extras. The filming for ‘Miami Connection’ was a thrilling rip roarer of a business…aaaand then it all kind of went tits up. Y’see…Woo was only in the country for a brief time and returned to Korea almost immediately after filming wrapped. That’s all well and good…except for the fact that some of what was shot needed to be RE-shot…and, so the legend goes, at a backer led private screening to show funders what their money had paid for, the original version had a totally different ending which almost ALL of the backers STRONGLY disliked. The resulting negative feedback left the film in a bit of a state of turmoil because Y.K wasn’t a filmmaker. In fact he’d done NOTHING in terms of working in film up to this point apart from starring in this movie as Mark.

So…he learnt. He took books out, read up on film theory and how to operate cameras, and with a skeleton crew he covered off the reshoots and rewrote/shot a completely new happier ending that the backers were more comfortable with. You’d think that would have solved the problem right? well…Miami connection was released to a limited number of theaters, entirely distributed, promoted and fully funded by Kim himself (rumoured to be in the millions…but i’m sceptical about that) and the film. Bombed. HARD. NO ONE went to see it, The critics who COULD be bothered to attend screenings trashed the thing as garbage and the film failed to secure any kind of widespread home distribution, leaving Kim MASSIVELY out of pocket and essentially holding an unsellable film.

Jump to 2009 when a programmer for the Alamo Drafthouse by the name of Zack Carlson was browsing around on online auction sites and spotted a 35mm copy of some movie called “Miami Connection” that he’d never heard of on sale for a mere $35. Carlson picked the film up on a whim and after checking it out, put it on for a screening. Some people came, they loved it, so he screened it again, more people came…and slowly, but surely the film developed a VERY active and invested fanbase.

Zack wanted to try and get the film out there to more people, and managed to find and contact YK.Kim who was still deeply hurt by the films flop, didn’t want to talk about it and thought that the calls from the Alamo Drafthouse were crank calls. It was only after much effort and negotiation that Kim came round to the idea that this may not be a prank and shortly thereafter the film was released to the world for the first time as a limited home release. The results of which saw the film’s popularity EXPLODE.

The plot of ‘Miami connection’ isn’t exactly the most coherent. Its base plot of “Good guys are targeted by ruthless bad guys, With the power of friendship conquering all” is probably one of the oldest types of story archetypes in writing. The problem is this film goes off in EVERY possible direction while trying to tell that plot. Whether it’s just the guys randomly eating breakfast in their shared house for 10 minutes, or the Miami Ninjas riding hogs into town for a silly amount of time, the whole thing could not feel more made up on the fly and odd if it tried.

The key driving force in this film is that Jeff, working on behalf of the Miami Ninjas, wants Dragon Sound off his turf…for some reason. It’s implied he thinks they’re either dealing on his patch, or he thinks that their “nice guy” attitudes will ultimately lead to confrontation and an uncovering of their shady business. But that’s never confirmed through the runtime, and Dragon Sound seem almost as confused as the audience for the most part as they aren’t selling drugs nor do they have ANY clue who Jeff and the Miami Ninjas are outside of Jeff being Jane’s “Shady” brother.

And it’s weird gaps in knowledge like that which plague this film chronically. SO much of the film is basically just “Don’t read too much into it, just go with it” and that can be refreshingly liberating almost as much as it can be frustrating. As soon as you accept that there are going to be plot points in this that don’t really go anywhere or are just happening because the films underunning then things become MUCH more tolerable, but if having a consistent plot that makes sense and ties everything up in the end is your bag, I think you may be in for a rough ride.

The act structure for this pictures all over the place, there’s a clear opening and closing act, but the 2nd act isnt defined anywhere near as well as it should be. There’s no real change of pace, it just kind of feels like the first act keeps going and going until the trigger point that signals the 3rd act happens. And that can be frustrating because, as an audience member the act structures help to signal where the viewer IS in the picture through subliminal coding.

The first act is *Supposed* to be slower as we’re introduced to our core cast, maybe throw a couple bumps in to help keep people interested. But it’s expected by the audience that first acts take their time in establishing things. Because, as we’ve seen with movies like “Halloween Night” and “Boarding House” just infodumping 20 characters onto the audience in a 5 minute window and then expecting them to just “get on with it”. Seldom if EVER works and often leaves the viewer feeling turned off by the thing before its even really begun.

The 2nd act should have a marked change of pace, things should speed up a bit, we’re familiar with our characters and the scenario that’s been presented, now’s the time to hit the gas and get right to the heart of the action, if you don’t rev up here, or WORSE you somehow manage to rev down and go slower STILL. Your audience will get impatient wondering what’s going on and why it’s taking so long to actually have a point or be interesting. This should then lead to a 3rd act and like any good orgasm, things should be warmed up, cranked to max speed and firing on all cylinders as we arrive at the point the previous 60 or so minutes have been building to.

Once you’ve hit that peak you have options on how to close the film, you can either warm back down to a satisfying but steady conclusion, or you can go out with a bang keeping that high paced speed rolling. But the important thing is that you pick a lane and stick to it because if you don’t put everything and the kitchen sink into your 3rd act, audiences who…lets be honest are generally not the most forgiving people in the world, will forget any goodwill they had for the opening of the film and wonder why the movie they’re watching suddenly gave up and ended crap.

Miami Connection Opens strong, it sets the characters up, builds its world and begins to establish a scenario and then…it just kind of idles around that area with the occasional garnish of “So bad it’s good” style delivery or brief scenarios that aren’t all that relevant punted in for good measure. It means that around the hour mark, when the film should be moving into its 3rd act. I was still wondering when the 2nd act was going to start. As we get locked into a repetitive cycle of Dragon Sound getting challenged to a fight, them being confused, a fight happening anyway, the band getting the upper hand for a bit until the baddies leave or someone breaks things up, rinse, repeat.

I’m not saying there isn’t fun to be had with that. But that idling really stalled the viewing experience for me, it tanks the pacing (which was already screwed..but more on that shortly) and just made my mind wander a bit until the 3rd act suddenly jolted 50k volts into this thing. Which is fine, but when the credits rolled and the best thing I could think was “Well..it opened and ended well” that kind of leaves a rather large hole in the middle of this movie.

The pacings shonky as well. Like I mentioned earlier I don’t know how much of this script was planned WELL in advance and how much was just “We have a gap in the runtime we need to fill” or “I have an idea, get the camera.” but there’s no natural flow to the sequences in this film, scenes just kind of happen…one minute you can be watching bikers in a bar drinking beer and throwing topless women around like sacks of oatmeal, the next it could be one of Dragon sound eating a baloney sandwich in a park talking about intercontinental friendship, the next it could be the owner of a club beating up a previous act, the next it could be someone reading the mail for 5 minutes. Stuff just kind of happens in the order it happens in because that’s just how the cards have fallen.

The repetition makes it even harder to really manage the pacing problems because, if Jeffs gang “jump” dragon sound at 10 minutes in, when they jump them again at 25 minutes, 45 minutes and an hour in EXACTLY the same way, intercut with shots of John doing his taxes or Mark just working out. Well, it doesn’t exactly instil me with the idea that these guys were making a clear and defined vision here…

Again though; that ISN’T to say that fun isn’t to be had with this thing, there are PLENTY of over the top crazy goofy and just plain odd moments that I thought were good fun and the film does have some real charm running through it that did endeare me. The on/off ramblings about friendship were a definite highlight for me personally and, well…im always a sucker for a slightly creaky picture. I may not 100% get on with the script, but I absolutely get on with the sincerity behind it.

On the direction front, it’s not bad! Not bad at all! Woo has managed to just about cultivate an interesting and largely professional looking project. Even if the script may be lacking, quite often the visual direction will help pull the film’s socks up and point it in the right direction, with the dragon sound music videos and the end sequence in the forests being definite highlights. It’s far from an engaging and “studio” grade experience. But compared to similar movies, with similar scope and budget. This thing does a really solid job that made me want to come back for more.

Direction of the cast by contrast is a bit more of a mixed bag with most of the cast being made up of students from Kims studios who’d never acted before in their lives before this. It’s fair to say this is a bit of a crap shoot as to who’s able to act and work to director instruction and who’s here basically to make up the numbers and try their best to not completely throw the film out of whack. For the most part, it’s about fine. Almost none of our core cast feel particularly “natural” in front of the camera, they almost all feel awkward, a bit stilted and unsure about what’s “in frame”.

This is particularly noticeable in the fight scenes themselves which absolutely have no sense of ‘mojo’, almost like when someones learning a dance routine for the first time, the fight choreography in almost all instances didn’t flow naturally. It’s almost like you can hear the cast members going “Move 1…okay onto…move 2!…okay!…now move…3!…ace! Right move 4!..” which really affects the vibe and pulls you as an audience member RIGHT out of the action. While they do use soft contact here to help make the punches and kicks look at least a bit believable, sometimes they choose the wrong angles in the edit and the result makes those punches and kicks feel like they have all the weight of a feather behind them.

Throw in some random effects filters such as frame dropping or slow motion and you end up with fight scenes that just feel WAY too heavily planned, being handled WAY too awkwardly by a cast of characters who aren’t looking or feeling confident and, up until this point, weren’t even actual actors.

The cine was somewhat lacking too for me…while I thought the music video sections were handled VERY well. Everything else just feels kind of flat. We see the same shot types over and over again which was disappointing, experimentation is pretty much left to video effects and given how much of the marketing emphasises “cool neon 80s!” In its branding there’s not really a lot of that on show, instead most scenes are either day for night blue, or just kind of beige and brown. Composition is uninspired with basic framing applied and seldom anything else, they don’t really follow traditional shot setups and it feels like the crew knew how to do two lighting setups, Day for night and “floodlit” because that’s all that’s here really.

Performance wise…look, no one gets out of this with much in the way of dignity. The only standout performers for me in this were Kim and Maurice Smith as Jim…and it’s not because they’re brilliant performers. It’s because they’re the cast members who I feel would most fit into an episode of Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace. The rest of the cast range from muted to awkward and just plain weird! Sometimes it works…sometimes it doesn’t. But on the whole, if you’re not one for cheesy oddness in your action movies…firstly; what are you doing watching 90% of commercially available action movies?…but secondly!…this maybe isn’t your rodeo.

And finally; the soundtrack! C’mon man! It’s Dragon Sound! 80s pop rock at its finest, seriously if you want the quickest way to figure out if this movie is for you, go boot up a spare tab and look up their track “Friends” it’s one of the first songs in this movie and it’s INCREDIBLE. Very much in the camp of “The Shimmy Slide” in terms of some of the most iconically funny and weird (but damn good) music ever put to film. And that pop rock edge envelops the whole movie. Seriously this is one HELL of an OST and I seriously regret not nabbing it on Vinyl when I had the chance!

‘Miami Connection’ Somehow managed to get a VERY limited VHS release at some point in the very late 80s or Very early 90s (though even collectors arnt 100% on exactly when that release came out) it was distributed by a company by the name of “Liberty Entertainment Group” and after that it fell into total obscurity until 2012 when it was issued on Bluray by Drafthouse films. That quickly went out of print and started going for silly money, and throughout the 2010’s the film would get multiple releases as “Limited edition” VHS throwback style issuings.

Finally in 2022, like buses we got not just one but TWO separate releases of Miami Connection within months of each other after a near decade long drought. One being from Umbrella Entertainment, which was just a standard blu ray release, and the other being a 3 disc 4k blu ray box set released by Vinegar Syndrome (which is the version I own) and this things just gorgeous. While I personally didn’t see *THAT* much difference between the bluray and 4k versions, I put that more down to a bloody good job having been done on the bluray release than a shoddy job being done on the 4k disc. When you consider that the original negative for the film was destroyed in 2004 and that this was a bit of a patchwork restoration. It’s understandable that this wouldn’t exactly be immaculate. The first two discs contain 1080p and 4k versions of Miami connection alongside commentaries, making ofs and much much more. The 3rd blu ray disc contains an early cut of the movie with alternate scenes, and other oddities which is perfect for the average die hard Miami connection fan who wants to try and see the film from a new perspective!

Ultimately; While Miami connection is an absolute hoot with some really fun moments, solid direction and just daft and over the top performances that charmed and enthralled. It wasnt one that ultimately won me over. I enjoyed it, I’d watch it again…but I didnt out and out LOVE it. Your milage may vary however and I hope that what both me and Triv have said here will help you make an informed decision! But, for me? While I had a bit of a soft spot for Miami connection, I didn’t feel like I out and out LOVED it in the way that many other fans of this movie do. It absolutely had its moments and the soundtracks amazing. But that second act is SUCH a hodgepodge of repetition and the cine varies in quality so much throughout that pound for pound, I just think there are better strange action movies out there. This would probably pair really well with something like “Day of the Panther” as a double feature, but it wouldn’t strictly be something I think I’d watch on its own…not for a while to come at least

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/miami-connection/1/

2018’s “Dead Heading” also known as “How I spent my weekend watching a woman explore a holiday inn” is a 2018 “Horror”, “Thriller” and I feel the need to use quote marks on those genres here because there’s neither frights nor tension to be found anywhere near this thing. The brainchild of David Easton, a (seemingly) british filmmaker (I can’t confirm that) who dabbles in independent filmmaking, and, rather unfortunately, we once again find ourselves staring down the barrel of a movie that’s had most of its marketing made up in order to try and shift copies. First and foremost, the air hostess on the front cover, I’m pretty sure isn’t in the movie, and if she is, she isn’t wearing that outfit, nor does she have red eyes at any point, NOR does she brandish a kitchen knife…oh she does wield a knife briefly…it’s a steak knife. Which is quite a step down from the full blown “halloween” staple.

There’s no fire in the film…at all, The tagline is “Evil on a Plane” Even though there isn’t barring about 5 minutes at the VERY end…and even then it’s not so much “Evil” more, a woman sat on a plane thinking menacing thoughts. The whole box art would imply that this was going to be some kind of slasher movie set on an aeroplane, with all the drama that can come with that. Given the pose of the woman on the front of the box and the ample cleavage on display, one could maybe even infer an element of “Basic Instinct” to proceedings. This is not the case.

The back of the box doesnt fair much better. All the imagery of planes? Well..there are shots of airplanes in this movie…stock footage of airplanes. The main image on the back of the box? Is only seen in a 1 second burst as a flashback. The shot of the housekeeper and the FBI agent happen at the VERY end of the film and both are also very brief flashbacks to boot! The shot of the terrified guy in the flat cap? A dream. And the shot of the woman doing a strange sort of “Kissy ” face? Yeah she’s in the film for collectively like…5 minutes and adds nothing really to the plot.

Even the blurb on the back of the box is somewhat misleading as it really emphasizes the plane based nature of this slasher…we only see Anna (our main character) ON a plane for collectively 5-10 minutes, about 5 minutes at the very VERY beginning and about 3-5 minutes at the very VERY end. I’m telling you this because, I dear viewer, found out all too late that this was in fact a terrifically misleading box made up to shift copies and that the actual film? Well. When I tell you that afterwards I went to letterboxed to see what other people made of it and got a barrage of Americans who were in a state of shock, confusion and disappointment because they’d picked it up for $1 at the dollar tree on the grounds of “How bad could it be?” only to find out JUST HOW bad it COULD be… Well I hope you treat this review as the warning I never received for this thing. #Deephurting

The film follows Anna, a cabin crew member on a flight from New York to London who’s fed up of her job, At this point, she’s been through three 7 hour flights this week alone and after a particularly hectic flight in which she was felt up twice, “Accidentally” broke a guys nose and spent a more than significant period of time stopping a girl from throwing up her lower intestine. She’s burnt out, exhausted. And just wants to check into her hotel room for the afternoon and get some sleep.

When Anna gets to the hotel however, the stresses don’t stop there, apart from a slightly letchy flight crew trying to hook up with her, she finds that she’s missing off the booking list and as such hasn’t got a room for the night, after properly kicking off, she eventually DOES get a room. And it’s from here that the film really kind of deteriorates. Because, y’see, this is an ultra low budget film. The film makers basically just booked out a room in a holiday inn (possibly two rooms…) and the rest of the movie really is footage from inside of those rooms. Occasionally at quieter points of the day, they’ve been allowed to film in the bar/restaurant part of the holiday inn, which believe me. Is a treat in this film…

So! She checks in, and… at this point I check out…I don’t quite know how to explain this but we basically spend between 10 and 15 minutes with her as she just checks her room out top to bottom. She goes to the toilet (and doesn’t wipe) burns her hand making a cup of tea when the kettle wasn’t even turned on, she gets a bath (no nudity), texts her fiance Simon, watches TV briefly, goes to sleep, wakes up in the early evening, reads the restaurant menu aloud, gets dressed, goes down to the restaurant, reads the menu AGAIN, orders a steak and chips and a large red wine, heads over to the bar part of the restaurant. Almost gets chatted up by a guy, but catches him before he starts and basically offers him a kiss if he’ll give her his glass of wine and leave her alone (which he does). And then she settles into reading.

And it’s here we meet “John” who catches Annas eye from across the bar, he’s also reading a book and drinking red wine, and he ushers Anna over offering to buy her a drink and have some light conversation, he explains that he’s a software developer who’s recently out of a relationship because he wasn’t ready to start a family. Anna explains that she’s a member of cabin crew and the pair really get on, in fact they get on a little too well…John wants to shag her. The pair drink late into the night and as things wind down, John shoots his shot. Only for Anna (who WOULD if she COULD) to shoot him down because she’s “Taken”. The pair embrace, say their goodnights and Anna heads to bed while John hangs around the bar.

Anna heads back to her room, only to be woken up a couple of hours later by a knock at the door. It’s John, who’s brought an unopened bottle of Champagne and two glasses. Anna opens the door to him and John once again tries to convince her of a shag, she says no and he seems a bit crestfallen, so she invites him in for a drink and to continue the conversation. The film doesn’t give us enough information to know for sure whether Anna was considering cheating, or whether she was just being nice. The fact this scene follows on from a text conversation between Anna and her friend Angela talking about how Angelas going to cheat on her husband with some of the flight crew, kind of implies that Anna has it in mind.

Anyway, John goes in, the door closes, we cut to black and when we fade up a LOT of time has passed. Clothes, glasses and other fodder litter Anna’s floor and Anna slowly but surely wakes up, gets her bearings and starts trying to recover. But it quickly becomes clear something isn’t right. Like…she has a strange red iron tasting liquid all over her clothes, her duvet is sticky and John is lying very still, not breathing and IS FUCKING DEAD.

Anna panics, gets into the shower fully clothed and cries saying “Please god no, not again” implying this has happened before. Annnd…well; the rest of the film is basically just Anna in her hotel room, trying to figure out the best way to get rid of John, this is really where the thriller side of things kicks in as she not only has to get rid of the body, she also has to clean her room up because, well, it’s covered in blood and broken glass, she also has to get rid of all evidence that John was even IN the hotel AND she has to avoid being caught by the various staff of the hotel who seem almost drawn to her room specifically for no reason.

And that’s pretty much the plot, I’d elaborate and give you the blow by blow on exactly what goes down, but; to be honest it quite literally is just Anna cleaning the place up, avoiding staff and figuring out how to get rid of the body. And while the twist ending is passably decent, I won’t spoil it for you here…I want you to suffer as I did. In a yawning 90 minute sprawl, will Anna make it back home scott free? Will John survive being repeatedly stabbed in the chest with a steak knife? And why does this film bother with a cabin crew if they’re only going to have them in a couple of scenes and then bin them off? All this and more will probably be answered if you’re bored and need to kill 90 minutes on Deadheading.

And man oh man I am NOT kidding about the inactivity here, this film is SO dull. Not only do we get 25 minutes of a woman getting off a plane, checking in, having a bath and getting some food to tolerate, but the first “Kill” in this horror thriller doesn’t happen until 40 minutes in and due to either the budget, the risk of damage to property or some other random reason almost all of the blood is pre-stained or CGI. hell; in one shot they actually CG water into a shower head because they didn’t have a waterproof kit bag for their camera. With closeups being covered by a watering can being poured onto her head!

What gore is on display is largely CG, VERY unrealistic and done in VERY short bursts that are quite literally blink and you’ll miss it. And we see almost nothing. All the actual shots of violence, we end up cutting away from, theres one VERY brief shot of a 2nd murder (1 hour and 7 minutes into this 90 minute thing) where someone gets stabbed in the face and threy DO show it! But it’s CG again VERY brief and they mask as much of it as possible with cuts that really diminish its effectiveness.

And because the whole film is told in such a way that we’re jumping around in time, the horror element pretty much doesn’t exist, because…the thing with horror is, it kind of happens “in the moment” and relies on suspense like. You can show horror in a flashback, that’s fine as long as its self-contained. But showing us something horrible, then flashing back to show how that horrible thing happened, then flashing forward again to the horrible thing, doesnt really work because once you’ve seen the horrible thing, cutting back to show (or in the case of this film not even show…IMPLY) what happened just means that you’ve undercut your own chance for terror and suspense. And with that gone, all you’re really left with is a woman wandering around a hotel room, touching things and cleaning for an hour.

Im gonna sound like such a horror “bro” here, but fuck it. i’d have been able to overlook the total lack of gore or horror had their at least been some nudity or even a sex scene thrown in just so that SOMETHING happened in that first 50 minutes of the films runtime.

So…if this horror thriller has only the absolute barest amount of horror, no nudity for the “Steamy” factor and barely anything resembling suspense. What does it have? Well…not a great lot. The script is frankly dull as dishwater, theres a 3 act structure thats clearly defined with act 1 being everything from the beginning up to the murder of John, Act 2 being everything from Anna waking up and finding John Dead up to the point where she finally settles on her method for getting rid of him, and Act 3 being a bit shorter than the other 2 acts and basically comprising of her doing the plan to get rid of the evidence and the big final act plot twists leading into the credits.

The problem is, the pacing of those first 2 acts, while consistent in the sense that they both run to around about the same length, contain SO much padding to the point that I think anyone with their head screwed on will likely switch off after half an hour. The first act runs to roughly 40 minutes and I feel honestly it could have run to 20 and have done what it needed to do in terms of explaining what’s going on more than comfortably, and even then that would’ve been a quite dull 20 minutes. But it would have been 20 minutes less of the interminable boringness we ended up with. The only real point of interest in this opening act is Anna meeting John and Johns murder. Pretty much everything else could be lost with no real loss to the overall plot.

The 2nd act runs to about 30 minutes and again, it could’ve EASILY been halved and still felt padded. I’m not joking, this is the only film I’ve seen where the lead actress has a bath and 2-3 showers in less than an hour and 5 minutes. There are times in this script where I feel like it was written IN THE HOTEL ROOM and the crew were just sitting around looking for things they could get their lead actress to do using only what was available.

What I will say though (and this is pretty much the only nice thing I CAN say about this movie) the 3rd act does at least pick up the pace a little bit, and the final 20 minutes, while bloated, are decent enough and manage to get things up to a pace where I didn’t want to claw my own eyeballs out. But it’s all too little too late. If the reward for 70 minutes of patience is 20 minutes of lukewarm plot resolution that AT BEST is just about “acceptable” (in my opinion I might add) that is not a Job well done, that’s a failure.

I think this could have been a half decent 40-45 minute short film. Chopping out the superfluous scenes, really trimming the fat down, this could easily jump from a stinker of a picture to something I’d be tempted to watch again. But because anything less than feature run time doesn’t sell, we end up with this. A short film that doesn’t know what to do with itself, so it burns time until it can do what it needs to. I don’t think I’m expressing myself clearly enough here when I say that this thing was SO dull, SO dull…it was SO dull it actually made me appreciate what an hour and a half really feels like. like…REALLY feels like. I can’t sugar coat it.

Additionally; none of the characters are particularly endearing or likable. I’m not saying every film has to have a likable main character, but it does kind of help the audience empathize with them a bit more if they have SOME level of emotional connection. Even if their a bastard, WE as the audience need to care if they live or die. And we just don’t have that with our cast here. All the characters are written to be generally unlikeable people. Whether it’s John being manipulative and, in places, a bit rapey. Or Anna swinging wildly between the script wanting us to sympathize with her, only to then have her basically bully people, mock them, be overly sarcastic and just generally unpleasant. I never fully knew where I stood with the cast in this thing, and while that sometimes can be used to great success in setting suspense and unease. Here, it just made me fundamentally lose investment in anyone involved because they were so all over the place I didn’t know who to invest in.

On a closing note, I have to say the dialogues…not great. It’s a bit stilted, VERY repetitious and again, much like the actual happenings in the film, a lot of it just kind of exists to get us from point to point as slowly as possible. And that does have a detrimental impact on the characters. Y’see with short films the expectation on character establishment and development is relatively low. Mainly because, there isn’t a lot of time to establish your characters, so it works best to introduce them, breadcrumb some info about them across the narrative and then use that breadcrumbed info to give your character either a problem they have to solve or a solution based on what they know or who they are.

Feature films have a MUCH higher scope in terms of setting up character development both in terms of who they are, where they come from, what they believe and there’s a lot of emphasis in features to make your characters grow, learn and develop throughout. Now…Anna as a character would work in a short film because, when we’re introduced to her at the start of the film, there IS a little something extra going on up there personality wise. Which could act as a good mask to hide her more “Homicidal” tendencies. It would, up front, allow the audience to feel like there was something not quite right with her and would have kept things fairly nippy, so when the “John is dead ” reveal happens the audience can go “OH! SHE’S A BAD’UN!” and feel smart that they could sense something wasn’t quite right earlier on with her.

But in this elongated format we spend too much time with Anna just kind of, being normal. It means when the more psychotic moments do come out. It’s jarring, but not jarring in a “OH! She’s a baddie!” way…jarring in a “Why is she doing this? She’s just been messaging her fiance telling him how much she misses him and now she’s stabbing a guy in a hotel room…” way. And I think as well, the fact that the other characters in this film AREN’T developed nearly as much as they kind of need to be creates problems too. Like, John gets a meaty bit of screen time to develop himself, and I actually feel like I know more about him than Anna honestly, but he still doesn’t quite feel right and he exits the film with me feeling like there was more planned for him to do, that ultimately never got worked out.

Angela and the rest of the cabin crew are another example. They REALLY didn’t need to be in this. Like; either develop them properly and have them in the film, or cut them out. Because this weird hokey cokey business where Angela ISN’T in the majority of the film, but keeps popping up randomly via text and at one point appears to literally just use angelas toilet as a moment of artificial suspense? Yeahhh it doesn’t work for me. Either involve her and have her be another of Anna’s victims, or better yet have her help Anna in hiding the body. Or chop her out, because in this format, she’s not needed.

The script was written, directed, produced and edited by David Easton, he’s a bit of an auteur in that sense, having 5 directing credits and 3 writing credits. And of those 5 directing credits 2 are unreleased and of the 3 writing credits, 1 is unreleased. Deadheading is probably his best known credit and, as of the time of recording, it’s also his last directing and writing credit.

On the direction front, to me? It’s frustrating because it HAS no curation. Everything is presented in painful detail, it all looks very flat and because the location is a hotel room, and a lot of the budget hotels tend to try and keep things minimalist and uniform it means we spend a lot of time in rooms that all look vaguely the same, with very little of interest to help add definition to the back of shots…literally 90% of the backgrounds in this thing are of white walls or the bed. You may think that 10-15 minutes of exploring a hotel room isn’t *REALLY* that long of a time. but I can assure you, when you’ve sat through Anna touching light switches, opening cupboards entering and exiting the bathroom MULTIPLE times, with NONE of this being relevant to the plot, largely in silence. it’s insufferable..

The idea of a director is to curate all the elements that help to make a film work and to do so in a way that ACTUALLY makes the film work. That’s why directors are so often lauded. Here? They’ve seemingly decided to go for a better safe than sorry approach and they’ve just documented EVERYTHING. Presumably so they’d have more to play around with in the edit. But because they’ve been SO cavalier in just grabbing everything, it’s kind of meant there’s no solid steerage on presentation. We just…see everything. In places it may as well be raw rushes for all the curation we have. And that’s a problem, because if your film doesn’t really have the sense of purposeful driving towards a point, it’s meandering, and when that happens…people turn off.

Direction of the cast, was…actually not too bad. In fact I’d say that side of things DOES work in this film’s favor, the cast all seem switched on, in the zone and I think the director does a good job of talking them through their scenes and what needs to happen. They seem to bring a bit of themselves to the role as well, which is always a nice touch. Had the film been a tighter product the direction of the cast would have shined through even more so than it already does and probably would have been its saving grace.

The Cine reeks of “Student film” vibes. What I mean by that is that student films (or early attempts at filmmaking from people still learning the craft) tend to (understandably) not be quite as confident in their delivery. This is because the filmmaker hasnt found their “Voice” or style yet, and their are some common tropes that generally befall these kinds of movies…One of those tropes is hardcore ‘Shot stuffing’ when sequence building. A common practice where a sequence that should really only need 2-3 shots to convey what’s happening (for example; someone notices there mobile phone is ringing, they go over and answer the call) will instead be illustrated with 5-10 shots all VERY quickly cut together with “Match cutting” to try and show off how good at continuity and shot listing they are.

This film has TONS of examples of that, moments where a scene that should take no more than 10 shots to do from beginning to end, ends up taking anywhere between 25-35 shots that cut every 3-5 seconds or so. It’s disorienting and while it IS impressive that they’re able to deal with match cuts like that. It’s annoying, and ultimately adds nothing to proceedings. The secret to a good edit is to only cut where necessary. You want your audience to flow through your story and cuts are designed to help tell that story in ways that acting, cinematography and direction simply can’t do. Cutting at an epilepsy inducing rate because you have a lot of shots of someone going to the toilet and boy howdy do you wanna use them! Help’s no one. It just subconsciously makes the audience wonder why we need to see someone taking a shit from 5 different angles.

Shallow depth of field isn’t really used as much as I’d have expected, but I don’t know if that’s down to them not having the lenses to pull off a convincing shallow pull, or whether it’s because the cameras they had didn’t have the ability to soft focus. To me it looks like low end DSLR footage, possibly even domestic camcorder given the year this came out. Composition is largely fair standing, nothing breathtakingly good, they largely follow the basic rules of composition (off centering, the rule of thirds, the line, blocking etc) but it’s all a bit uninspired and some shots just look downright ugly. For example; the shots of the hotel room on the ultra wide angle lens, where it looks like they haven’t “Defisheyed ” it, or cutaway shots like when Anna makes a cup of tea where it’s underexposed, shakey and unpleasant.

All this combined with a lackluster color grade which, does at least TRY to make the film look a bit stylized but ultimately looks mostly washed out and untreated, even with some snazzy lighting kits and gels for added effect. It just…doesn’t look or feel quite as powerful as I feel it could and when combined with the above issues only exacerbated things further.

Performance wise, well…there’s only really two people to talk about and that’s Lisa Ronaghan and Bryan Larkin. Mainly because all the other cast members who turn up in this thing are barely in the movie and when they do, they’re not great…but hey, we’ve all gotta start somewhere. Lisa’s performance is fine, she does an acceptable turn as a leading lady in a “Horror” film. There are a few awkward deliveries here and there which I can put down to her putting on an American accent (she’s british) but, it’s a damn decent attempt at an American Accent (at least to my ears) it was convincing enough that I only found out she was actually british when I started collecting notes for this movie and found her demo reel. Her physical performance is a bit of a mixed bag, but I think she does about enough to carry the film, which given how bare it is, is quite impressive.

As for Bryan. He’s…okay. He gives a bit of a muted performance, and while that might work in certain circumstances, here? It just kind of makes him come across as a bit aloof, and as such he never really gets a moment to properly define his character. So he just sort of, gets through his bits decently enough and then exits. What I WILL say is the man can’t drunk act. He just can’t. He tries! But he just comes across as giving the same muted performance as when he was sober…just slower talking and more flailing. Sooo…yeh. It’s not a winner for me.

And finally; the soundtrack! It’s completely unremarkable. To the point that, in trying to remember it for the purpose of this review I had to go back to my notes and even after briefing up on my notes, I’m STILL none the wiser. I seem to recall it basically being drone noise. Occasionally punctuated with the odd spooky synth sting. which…I suppose being unmemorable in some regards is better than being bad. But it’s still not great when I couldn’t even hum you a bar from this thing.

Deadheading was released on DVD in 2018 by Echobridge acquisition corporation. It’s as barebones as it comes, just the film and a menu and that’s it. The Picture quality is fine enough. As far as I can see this is a US only release, it’s on streaming in the UK but I can’t find a UK physical release anywhere. Which I find quite funny, that a film that’s shot in the UK, Largely in a UK hotel with an all UK cast only got a physical release in the US and even THEN it only got a release in the US to populate Dollar stores and traumatize trash divers like myself. Eesh.

While I’d stop short of calling Deadheading one of the worst films I’ve ever seen. It is VERY hard to like this thing, from the script being bloated and stretched WELL beyond its natural run time, to all the main characters being largely unlikeable, to disorienting editing and flat lifeless cine and direction that largely feels like every scrap was used rather than the choicest cuts. This was an endurance test to sit through. When I can confidently say this film is basically Barry J. Gillis’s “Things” but somehow LESS endearing, less interesting and even MORE pointless…I hope I convey my absolute dislike of this thing. And the fact it has such potential to be so much better is the thing that hurts the most.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dead-heading/1/

Y’know…going into 1989’s Blind Fury I was a little more than apprehensive. I mean you’ve got to appreciate, an 80’s action comedy movie mainly following a blind swordmaster played by Rutger Hauer is shaky ground as a pitch. I was flashing back to movies like “Soul Man” fully expecting to be submerged into 90(ish) minutes of horrifically offensive jokes about blind people, rejected naked gun visual gags, poor choreographed action sequences and an end result that would likely have resulted in my exile from youtube and ostracization from society.

But what this film actually IS, actually kind of surprised me…

The film follows Nick, a blinded army veteran who served in Viet Nam, in the opening of the film we see Nick back in 1969 serving in the army after surviving a helicopter crash that was *presumably* supposed to be taking him and his army buddies home, after wandering through the swamps for a while completely unaware of what’s around him, he’s captured and taken to a local village, where his wounds are treated, he’s recuperated back to good health and while there, some of the villagers decide it may be interesting or entertaining to train him how to wield a sword. At first he’s an amusement for the village, they throw fruit at him and generally try to wind him up a bit. But over time his skills sharpen, he becomes much more disciplined in the art of swordsmanship, he becomes able to focus his hearing allowing for him to be much more aware of things generally around him, and after some time and training he’s able to perfectly hit anything thrown at him.

It’s from here that some time passes and we pick back up with Nick 20 years on in Miami Florida, and Nick looks like he’s loving life wandering the byways and highways avoiding dog doo and mistaking crocodiles for dogs. He heads inside a local bar where a gang are, generally being unpleasant and after some shenanigans in which they ruin Nicks Burrito with extra hot sauce when he said he wanted mild and they try to steal a ladies purse (and possibly worse) Nick illustrates that, 20 years on, the skills he learn in Nam are VERY much still present and sharp as ever.

We’re then transported to Reno Nevada where a fellow by the name of Frank Deveraux is…hanging around. Literally. He’s in debt to a local casino by a fair wodge, and the casino responded to this debt owing by casually hanging him over the side of the top floor of the casino and basically threatening to murder him (or kidnap or murder his family) if he doesnt either pay back his debt or agree to work for the casino manufacturing VERY illegal drugs, for them to sell to clear their own debts. After the intimidation, the owners of the casino mention in passing that they think Frank will be more cooperative if his family are “Taken into the care” of some of the casino’s thugs…I mean, hired staff…and they mention that the Deverauxs were last known to be based in Miami.

And wouldn’t you know it; We then INSTANTLY cut to Nick wandering up a path towards the front door of the Deverauxs. After knocking on the door Frank’s wife…or should that be Ex wife Lynn answers and when Nick explains that he and Frank were army buddies she lets him in. Nick explains that he’s traveled here to see Frank and catch up on old times. But unfortunately only a short time ago Frank and Lynn divorced and Frank moved to Reno to go and gamble. Nicks is introduced to Frank’s kid Billy, who’s…a character. I think it’s fair to say, who shows a vague interest in Nick before clearing off to go do some kid stuff.

After a bit more catching up, there’s a knock at the door and two police officers appear claiming they need to speak to Billy as they believe he witnessed a crime and they need him to go with them to provide more information. Lynns confused as Billy hasn’t mentioned anything about a crime taking place and when the questioning gets a bit TOO deep for the cops they reveal they’re 2 henchmen from the casino led by a tall creepy type called “SLAG”. Within minutes, it’s all kicking off. Bullets are flying, limbs are being lopped off and by the end, the cops are either dead or mortally injured, Slags jumped through a plate glass window and Lynn lies dead on the floor with a gunshot wound to the chest. Her dying wish being for Nick to take Billy to be with his father Frank by any means necessary.

And so, Nick and Billy begin their journey to reno and many shenanigans befall the pair along the way, including tripping over in the mud, Billy realizing what happened to his mum and running away, Slag returning for an epic showdown in a cornfield and calming exchanges of words of wisdom under the stars. Eventually; they finally arrive in Reno and they head to an apartment where Frank’s current Girlfriend “Annie” is waiting for them. Unfortunately Annies being used as bait and the minute the pair enter the apartment Nicks knocked unconscious, the pair are grabbed, and the baddies speed off back to the casino.

Luckily for the plot, Billy is able to wriggle out of the rope they’ve been bound together with and upon freeing Nick the pair beat up the henchmen and take off on a high speed chase of EPIC proportions! Resulting in two VERY injured henchmen and an extended sequence in which the three escapees wander around a field aimlessly looking for Nick’s Cane/Sword thing. Eventually; they head over to a friend of Annies called Coleen to lie low at her trailer and plan their next move. Nick informs them he’s going to the casino himself to try and stake the place out in the hopes of finding Frank.

And what follows is a final act of thrills, spills brawls and crawls as Nick fights his way through casino floor looking for his friend, unveils a secret illegal *fixed* gambling racket AND faces a final showdown with Slag, in a frankly WILD finale that I won’t spoil here for you lovely people, Will Nick find Frank in one piece?! Will the casino get it’s luuuuuuurvly druuuugs!? And Did Nick REALLY hate that extra Spicy Burrito? I mean; his initial reaction was surprise and pain, but then he kind of drops being in pain like it was all an act…and I don’t know if it was an act or not, I’m SO confused. Anyway something something something slashy slashy BLIND FURY!

And honestly; given what I’ve been through so far with this run, I was NOT expecting a lot from this. At MOST I was expecting a “passable” experience with some poor taste jokes. But; honestly? This thing’s good. Decent even!. It’s apparently a *loose* western adaptation of one of the stories of Zatoichi the blind swordsman and I could certainly feel the influence present here in terms of narrative structure.

What we have here is a script that’s textured unusually. But not an unpleasant one. It’s tristar entertainment and with studio fodder there’s kind of a preset expectation that the basics here will be of a standard and in play (even pacing, a 3 act structure, character progression and development…a point.) all that good stuff. And well; basically yeh, all that’s here, we have a decently paced 3 act narrative that follows a basic rescue plot trope from start to finish with very little deviation. It’s a solid, if not slightly generic piece that decently rumbles along without too much in the way of issues.

What gives this film a little spice, just…something to kick it up from being a generic action movie is the tonal choices they’ve gone for, and particularly in the comedy style they’ve decided to work with. Y’see; the comedy in this film is…odd. I think they were aiming for sarcastic cool humor, y’know, the type of humor where the hero can quip, do puns, maybe even give a facial reaction that suggests humor. It’s not like ACTUAL gags. More intention in actions and the way in which lines are supposed to be delivered that makes the humor work.

Unfortunately for this script 2 factors are in play in the movie that derail this. The first being that there just aren’t enough moments where that kind of comedy is utilized, meaning comedy happens enough to be “A thing” but not enough to actually make it feel natural within the script. But then also not helping things is Hauers decision to play the humor in this script as goofy and cheesy as possible. It comes across as awkward, like it’s been rammed in there rather than feeling like a natural extension of the character. I’d lean towards studio intervention on the humor in this thing quite honestly, as, from what I can gather, the film was supposed to be a quite faithful loose adaptation of zatoichi..at least initially…and I could see a contrast of lighter and darker moments working quite well there.

There’s points in this film where it gets VERY bleak very quickly, and I could see those moments tonally gelling quite well with some lighter moments. But instead the VERY bleak moments are married up to just…daft moments. Like Haurer pulling faces, prat falling or acting incredibly sarcastic. The henchmen are written almost like cartoon characters and the whole thing as a result just, feels a bit off to me. Which…ironically has probably given it the distinction it needed to break away from being pigeonholed alongside all the other middle of the road action flicks from that time. The odd humor, the strange decision to make some of the cast have completely serious performances while making others loony toons characters has resulted in something that…to me is neither good nor bad. But it IS different.

The dialogue’s also a bit all over the place too…in an enjoyable way mind! But yeah…it starts off pretty standard really for movies of this fair…maybe a couple of light hearted hints towards humor but otherwise pretty sturdy and serious with the aim of establishing our characters and goals, but as the film goes on it slowly turns into a free for all, the dialogue begins to drift into the cartoonish…I mean, for my money it never *quite* gets there, despite getting bloody close on multiple occasions. But it does seem to just stray further and further away from what the initial set up was supposed to be until the end when it snaps back to reality. It gave me a bit of tonal whiplash to go from baddies grandstanding from their abandoned ski lodge mountain top lair to a quite touching moment between Nick and Billy.

When combined with a cast who largely mumble their lines because they’re action hero’s they’re supposed to be cooler than thou…so of course they’re going to only speak through pursed lips for a decent chunk of the runtime. It creates a situation where you have to strain to hear what our characters are saying in places and when you finally do make out what’s being said it’s usually some kind of nonsense that was SUPPOSED to be delivered as a withering pun, but has instead been delivered with a cheshire cat grin and a look like Haurs frontal lobe is out to lunch. Which again! Isn’t a bad thing! It’s just VERY unusual.

To be honest, if I was being picky, i’d say the only genuine criticism I’d level at the script is the ending itself. It doesn’t so much resolve more…stops. There’s no actual closure. Nick beats up one of the main henchmen in the movie while the ACTUAL baddies, the casino owners threaten Billy with a bullet to the head. There’s an altercation and we fade to black and on fading up it’s all resolved…with ZERO explanation for how Nick stopped the casino owners, where Frank vanished to or how they got off the mountain. We just crossfade away from what is arguably the main point of the films existence. Into a totally defused ending that felt tacked on, rushed and didnt feel like it matched the rest of the tone or pacing of the rest of the film by any measure. It literally feels like there’s a scene or two missing from the final cut. Which was a bit disappointing to me when the journey had been quite enjoyable.

But otherwise what we have here is a script that’s studio grade passable and just odd enough to take it above what would be considered a passable experience for the genre. It’s not something you’d be clamoring to watch again in a hurry, but I’d absolutely watch it again in future given the chance.

The Script was written by Charles Robert Corner, he has 17 writing credits with a project currently in active development! Looking at his list there was nothing that immediately caught my eye, so I’d say this may be his best known work…though he did write “Gymkata ” and I know that thing definitely has its fans. The film was directed by Phillip Noyce. Who has 64 directing credits with several in various stages of active production as of the time of recording! He’s australian born and he had some pretty decent hitters in his resume including “The Bone Collector”, “Heatwave” and “Roots”

And on the direction front, this is just a damn fine piece of work, it’s not mesmerizing, it’s not pushing the limits of cinema. But y’know what? Noyce has managed to create an entertaining feature here that seldom had me clock watching and kept things as visually interesting as possible across the runtime. Scenes pop with a liveliness that I thought was pleasant enough and while I wouldn’t go as far as to say Noyces style is distinct against the genre at that time. It’s clear that he worked very closely with the cinematographers to produce a work that DOES feel tight, to the point and most importantly its an end product that feels like the director gave a damn about what made it onto the screen.

Direction of the cast is good and solid too, with most of them being highly animated, very maneuverable around the scenes and settings and as mentioned there’s almost a cartoonish quality to it in places that definitely helps really amp up the end product in ways that other buddy action films or action comedies from the time couldn’t quite muster.

In particular, a lot of work clearly went into realizing Nick as a character for both Noyce and Haur. Haur himself actually claimed this was one of his most challenging roles of his career because he had to balance the sword play elements with his character having a serious affliction. Mercifully; I think Noyce and Haur get the balance about right between giving Nick weight in terms of what happened to him being a plot factor, but they do give him some layers to play with physically through his mannerisms and how he holds himself. Noyce really pulls the best out of Haur here and gives the audience a spectrum to play with that, by the time the credits came around, it really felt like you got to know Nick fairly well.

It would also be amiss of me not to mention the direction and choreography around the fight scenes, which is tight, works well and looks great. They utilize quick cuts in the edit alongside masked punches and sword swishes to help create some decent combat sequences that look great and can even get a little intense in places. It’s not without its faults mind. I don’t know if they were trying to do a recurring gag, but there were a couple of instances where they had Nick slash his sword at someone, they’d flail as if they’d been killed, only to then reveal they were actually alright and that Nick had either *just* missed them, or done something less drastic (like cut their eyebrows off or ripped their shirt) the first time it was funny, but after that It just left me kind of eye rolling and wondering if the film had underun or something?

To me? The cine is probably where the film shines, this production has visuals that it ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT DESERVE. I was honestly beyond impressed with pretty much the whole feature in terms of not only its array of composition, but in terms of the variety of shot types and interesting experimentation that the film worked with. The absolute highlight for me has to be the scene in which Billy finds out about his mothers death and heads off into the cornfield. It’s a scene that NOT ONLY manages to nicely balance humor and somber tones through the cine and direction, but it manages to create an atmosphere that feels tense, funny and entertaining all in equal measures all in rotation and it juggles this while effortlessly swapping between al the various tones creating a blend that you’d think wouldn’t work…but actually does surprisingly well.

Performance wise, I’ve already sung Haurs praise for his dedication in trying to give a believable turn in the role. He owns each and every scene he’s in, he expresses and emotes perfectly for the situations as they unfold and he brings some genuine depth to a character that could have easily just been a caricature. So serious kudos to him, he really does knock this one out of the park, giving a performance that again, this film ABSOLUTELY did not deserve. Randall Cobb also delites here as “Slag” the lead henchman for the Casino. He’s a solid menacing presence who was a PERFECT fit to put up against Haur in this thing, every scene he’s in is such a delight to sit through and his final scene in this movie is just astounding and worth the price of admission alone.

The rest of the cast actually pose an interesting problem because…well…they’re having to go up against very animated and charismatic performances. As such…They kind of just sort of blend into the background of everything that’s going on. They more than do what’s required of them, and I think the director got what was needed. But if you’re up against Haur and Cobb who are putting their absolute all into these roles. You’re always going to be somewhat overshadowed…they’re decent. But struggle to pull off anything truly memorable.

And finally; the soundtrack! And mild mumbles from the actors aside, what we have here is a decent acoustic sounding score that’s honestly unlike anything I’ve quite heard before. It has that actiony edge, but there’s a tinge of “World” music about it, a tinge of woodwind and percussion. And a smidge of rock in the mix as well. The results are quite delightful to listen to honestly, one of the better action scores I’ve heard in quite some time. So I’d say big win on that front! I’d love to hear it isolated some day!

Blind Fury was released on VHS in the UK by RCA Columbia in 1990 on rental, it would later receive a home video release by VCI and the cinema club in 1997. It had multiple DVD releases over here as well with the earliest being in 2004 and a reissue on DVD and bluray happening in 2018 courtesy of Fremantle.My version came courtesy of mill creek entertainment who released a limited edition “retro vhs” version of the release with a rather nifty slipcover. Extras are a little thin on the ground, but the picture quality is top notch, and I believe it’s still in print and goes for dirt cheap! So grab it while you can!

I thought Blind Fury was a hoot! While i’d stop short of saying I loved it, I could definitely recommend checking this one out. It actually stunned me when I found out this film didn’t perform too well at the box office. They were gearing up for a sequel just before the film got a public release, but despite positive reviews and two thumbs up from Siskel and Ebert, it bombed at the box office in the US and as such the studio restricted it’s european release to only a handful of cinemas. The film managed to do quite well despite a brief cinema run in the UK, where Hauer was a known household name due to his appearances at the time in a very successful string of adverts for Guiness. As such, people picked the movie up based on word of mouth and Haurs appearance alone and subsequently it ended up being one of the top 10 VHS rentals over here for quite a few weeks.

While it’s nice the film did eventually find a bit of success, I think it deserved better than the hand it was dealt on this. With a quirky and tonally unusual script, fantastic direction and cine some more than reasonable performances and a HELL of a decent score, I think Blind Fury is a movie you really need to check out sooner rather than later. I could see it pairing up quite well with movies like “American Ninja 5” or maybe even something a bit out there like “Robot in the family”…So if you’re bored this weekend and looking for a pick me up. Maybe give this one a try!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/blind-fury/1/

2014’s Bigfoot vs D.B Cooper is aaaa….*scrabbles about wildly*…thing. It exists. It exists, and defies genre definition. It is anti-cinema, it has *some* VERY light horror elements, but isn’t a horror film, it predominantly features shirtless men stripping down to their boxers for candid shots, but it isn’t *strictly* porn. It has D.B Cooper and narration describing his infamous plane heist. But it isn’t a drama. I’d say I’d struggle to tell you what DID happen in the movie, but even that would be a fib because I can tell you EXACTLY what happened in this thing and the answer is; not a fat lot.

The film is the brainchild of one David Decoteau The man who bought us “Chickboxer” and “Final Scream”, and here; we’re looking at one of his “latter day” works, and…arguably one of his more sadistic offerings…i’d be kind here in saying that this “isn’t one of his best”. In fact; when “Red Letter Media” covered it on their show “Best of the Worst” they declared this film to be “The Worst movie that they had EVER covered on the show.” and now having sat through all 76 minutes of it, i’d be pressed to disagree.

What I’m going to do here is tell you EXACTLY what happens in this film from start to finish. Spoilers and all, not because I’m being mean and want you to find out how the film ends…but because if I don’t mention the ending there WILL be no talk about the plot, because frankly there’s practically nothing here.

So! The film opens in 1971 and takes place in Ariel Washington in some woodlands. We’re introduced to Bernie, Our (sort of) main character in this (but…not really because he doesn’t really do much) who’s future incarnation is also our narrator for the film, recounting the events of one fateful day when he was hiking in the woods. What follows is 11 minutes of Bernie walking in the woods while a guy in a frankly awful bigfoot costume skulks around (it’s implied it’s watching Bernie) intercut with random location footage and in between the lakes and hiking is 11 MINUTES of interspersed title cards.

After this; we then get an introduction to D.B Cooper basically setting up who he is and what he did, D.B (known as Dan) was a mysterious man who, in 1971 caught a flight and while in the air revealed to an air hostess that he’d bought a bomb on the plane and that his demands were for a parachute, a gun and a large sum of money. He then grounded the plane, evacuated the flight of everyone barring the pilots, took off again and while being tailed by two fighter pilots he jumped from the plane with his parachute, the gun and the money and disappeared, never to be seen again.

We only spend a brief time with D.B in the opening, basically picking up with him as he prepares to board the plane (mainly made up of Stock footage of airports) At this point we cut back to Bernie who, it’s revealed actually WASN’T just hiking randomly in the woods, he was actually heading to a house just on the outskirts of the forrest that he thought would be a good place to getaway for a few days and unwind. However; when he arrives, he’s greeted at the door by a shirtless guy who tells him that him and a load of other shirtless guys have all come up to the house to celebrate one of their crew’s upcoming wedding. With thanksgiving also coming up they’ve decided that, not only will this be a sort of Bachelor party, but they’re also going to hunt some Turkeys.

Bernie still seems a bit confused, but the guys basically offer to take him on board as part of the hunting/bachelor party experience and… after offering him a beer, Bernie accepts! We also see Bigfoot skulk about a bit more and then we cut back to D.B who’s now on the flight and threatens the stewardess with the bomb, giving her his demands on a napkin. What then follows is an extended sequence of 2 of the guys from the house jogging, they stop to get changed, but that’s it. Back at the house, the guys discuss exactly how the turkey shoot is going to go down and they agree to split into 2 teams of 3 and to make it a bit of a competition, but one of the guys isn’t up for killing animals, so they decide to be a team of 2 and a team of 3 instead. The two guys who went out jogging get back and everyone confirms the plan. What happens next, is insane.

As we as the audience are effectively held captive when, not once. Not twice, not three times. BUT FOUR TIMES we are FORCED to watch 4 of the actors in this movie do exactly the same thing, one after the other for 5-10 minute stretches. They wander around the house aimlessly, walk into a bedroom, strip down to their underwear, pillock about for a bit and then put their pants back on. FOUR TIMES. And the only reason I say it’s four times is because, really, IT’S FIVE TIMES. But the fifth time it happens is *SLIGHTLY* different. Because after the 4th time all the guys (apart from the bachelor) decide to finally get the hunt underway, so they head out of the house leaving the bachelor guy by himself. The same shenanigans happen AGAIN but this time he calls his wife briefly, goes to get a shower, fake jerks it in the shower, and then bigfoot who’s been on and off stalking the house for the last 45 minutes or so breaks into the house and kills the bachelor in the shower. But there’s no blood, no visible sign he’s even been hit and Bigfoot ISN’T EVEN IN THE SAME ROOM. THEY JUST FILMED AN ACTION SHOT ON A BLACK BACKDROP AND CALLED IT A DAY!

45 minutes in, the film once again remembers D.B cooper is supposed to be in this movie (albeit briefly) as he hops out of the plane to collect his demands and then evacuates the plane and takes off again (although, the stock footage still shows the plane as full, despite what the narration says). And what follows is basically the guys all titting about in the woods talking absolute bollocks that has NO impact on the story, but slowly, one by one the guys decide to go back to house for one reason or another (be it bathroom breaks or just not being arsed about hunting anymore) and one by one, as they get back to the house the same thing happens over and over AGAIN. They wander around the house a bit, and either find bigfoot who kills them, OR! They wander around the house for a bit, find one of their friends dead (but seemingly untouched) and when they try to flee the house (which takes AGES) they find Bigfoot who kills them. All in the same way, all in the same style.

After a while the only 2 people left are one of the bachelor bros and Bernie who tells the bro that there’s myths about these forests involving killer creatures, the bro laughs at him for believing a load of folk tales and when he isn’t paying attention Bernie whacks him with the butt of his gun, knocking him unconscious.And…if you can believe it, well over an hour and 5 minutes into this thing. We’re gonna get the first actual bit of plot beyond the dross we’ve encountered so far.

As, after having knocked the bro out, Bernie heads to a specific spot in the woods and it’s revealed that…BERNIE AND D.B COOPER ARE PARTNERS IN CRIME! And that Bernie served under D.B in Viet Nam. Oh. and the knocked out bro wakes up and almost immediately gets killed by Bigfoot. So…yeah he’s gone. Anyway! D.B and Bernie reconnect, and shortly thereafter the pair hear the bro being killed and rush over to see what the matter is, where they encounter Bigfoot…and…there’s no other way to say it really…D.B Cooper and Bigfoot have a VERY brief fight. Mano a bigfoot-o. And D.B seemingly wins. Killing bigfoot in cold blood. But! There’s a plot twist. As Bigfoot scratched D.B pretty badly and while Bernie thinks it’s a healable wound, D.B tells Bernie to run. When Bernie tries to help, D.B roars at him and it’s revealed that, like werewolves. If someone gets scratched by bigfoot and lives, they themselves become a bigfoot. Bernie flees and the film ends by saying that somewhere, out there RIGHT now…is D.B Bigfoot. Cut to black, end credits. Fin. what the fuck-.

And the thing is, I don’t really know what to do with this…thing? Because; it almost feels unfair to hold this thing up to the usual standards I cover for these movies. It’s just people jogging, walking or stripping down to their undies ALL SHIRTLESS for about an hour and 5 minutes of the hour and 16 minute runtime. So the debate I’m having is, do I judge this film by what it IS or do I judge the film by what it SHOULD be? Because if I’m judging it by what it SHOULD be, it’s arguably one of the worst movies i’ve ever seen. If I’m judging it by what it’s trying to do, then it’s not great. But it’s not bad.

I’m fairly convinced that there was no script for this, not in the conventional sense. There may have been a running order of events, something approaching a story outline. But; given how little dialogue there is in this film and given that; what dialogue there is seems to be badly improvised in terms of quality. I don’t honestly believe that there’s a page by page breakdown of what happens in this film available. If there is, it’s painfully thin and largely filled with action instructions. What IS presented here is essentially a 10-15 minute movie with an hour’s padding stapled to it, and really poor padding at that. I can handle some padding, hell, if the paddings well written, even if it’s not linked directly to the main story. If it’s well handled it CAN end up being funnier or more entertaining than the main film itself!

That’s not the case here, it’s just inane. Inane to the point that, I don’t really know who the TA is for this honestly; people coming to see ripped guys get naked WONT sit through the weird bigfoot/D.B cooper subplot, the jogging and the random wandering around the house when pornhub exists. Horror fans SURE AS SHIT wont sit through this thing for what horror’s on display. Even some of the more hardcore David Decoteau fans I know have neither the patience or inclination to sit through this thing because SO LITTLE actually happens in it.

The pacing is like drowning in glue, the padding drowns what little plot there is to the point that it makes the whole thing an absolute test in patience. So much so that, by the time the fight between Bigfoot and D.B finally happens (which IS actually quite entertaining and dumb in equal measures) I didnt care about it because I’d lost interest about 25 minutes in and was literally just watching at this point to get to the end of it. It’s just not worth it. It’s not worth watching an hour and 10 minutes of meandering for collectively about 5 minutes of, not even interesting, moderately dumb goofing about.

Theres no real act structuring, theres no lynch pin moments. The film just sort of vomits out this fluff, occasionally remembering that if it DOESNT put a few plot points in here and there, then it literally WOULD just be a “documentation” of people wandering around a wood in 2014, rather than an actual film that people have to PAY to SEE. I can’t even really talk about the dialogue because A: there’s not a lot of it, and B: what dialogue there is is dreadful, aimless, stilted and really properly feels like Decoteau just told them to talk bollocks and walk for a couple of minutes until they got the take. This thing makes “Chick Boxer ” look like War and peace, it makes “Things” look like “Avengers Infinity wars” it’s THAT slow and pointless.

The film was “Co-written” and Directed by David Decoteau who we’ve covered the filmography of a few times in the past, a fun piece of trivia about this movie though is that Decoteau marketed this film as starring Linnea Quigly who even appears on the DVD commentary track for the movie!…she’s not in this film. She has one line of dialogue that’s been dubbed in. She has top billing on this film. holy shit…The film was also “co-written” (used in the loosest possible way) by Harvey Shaiman. I can assure you, I pissed myself out of rage and laughter when I found out that THIS movie of all things had TWO writers…Stunned. I’m stunned. Harvey has 3 writing credits, and this was his last (and probably best known) work.

On the subject of direction, I’m again posed with the question “Do I judge this by film standards, or by what’s being presented?” because, if I lower my standards so far as to judge the film on what’s here, the direction’s pretty passable. You have an hour of people walking around and getting changed. David’s managed to effectively capture that and while it’s maybe a little bit lacking in terms of creativity (I personally feel the sequences could have done with just a few more cutaways honestly) for what this is, it doesn’t look awful.

Judging this on basic standards of cinematic integrity? This films dead behind the eyes from a directing standpoint. It’s flat, lifeless, and BECAUSE of the script it’s working with it’s horrifically restrictive on what it can really do. Honestly? The script should never have left Decoteau’s computer. Letalone got to the point it was directed and shot. It’s painfully by the numbers production that’s trapped by its own total lack of interesting or unique happenings. I’d rather go for a walk for an hour and 16 minutes myself, than sit through this. And I am NOT a walker by trade.

Direction of the cast is poor. But then, again. When the script basically just says “Bernie walks for 11 minutes and doesn’t say anything” how do you work with that? Seriously; how do you direct a cast member on that other than telling them to walk from point A to Point B? Nothing happens while they’re walking/jogging/exploring. The closest to cast direction we get in this film are the scenes where the guys strip to their undies. But that could best be described as David off camera shouting “Caress your Abs more!” and the final fight between D.B and Bigfoot…which again; is less a creative choreographed fight to the death and more a sighing “Well…people have made it this far, might as well make Bigfoot ACTUALLY verse D.B Cooper” it’s deathly dull with a total lack of creativity behind it.

The cine is much the same story as the direction. If I’m judging it from a bar on the floor “This is the script” perspective. They don’t do too badly. Composition is reasonable, they sometimes do some interesting shots, there’s a sense of variety, though I feel it could have really done more to make those sequences really sing. Even if it was just the occasional additional shot, the odd close up, the occasional cut back from a closeup to a mid. It’s those kinds of bridging shots that are really missing from this thing. But of what’s presented, if you put shit in, you’re gonna get shit out. And this is probably the best outcome for the sheer BOLLOCKS that’s been put in.

Judging it “with standards” however, it’s barely a movie, there’s an over reliance on stock footage and B-roll, and not even particularly attractive Stock or B-roll. They’re the most uninteresting bland shots compositionally that I’ve seen. Like. ALL this footage could just as easily be available on a stock site for free, and no one would bat an eye. It would have been nice to maybe have some dutch angles, some close up B-roll, to have ACTUALLY shot bigfoot in the woods and the house for the kill shots rather than shooting him on a black backdrop as a pickup shot and just inserting him in whenever they forgot or couldn’t be arsed to get the shot. It’s TERRIFICALLY slapdash in terms of it’s assembly, with the only positive thing I can say about being that at least they didn’t grade it to be washed out and drab like most horror/dramas of this ilk did and continue to do, AND at least they managed to shoot indoor AND location footage. Some films only do one or the other, but at least this has the woods AND a house to deal with. I know that sounds ridiculous but trust me, when you’ve seen some of the shite I’ve seen. Having 2 locations is a small mercy. Not that they do a tremendous amount with it.

There ARE no good performances in this film, it’s just hunk a dunk guys being hunk a dunks for 76 minutes barely saying anything and barely doing anything but strolling around, sometimes with guns, and even their death scenes when Bigfoot gets them could not be delivered more half heartedly if they tried. In fact, I don’t even think most of them ARE actors. From what I can see on IMDB, most of them only have credits in David Decoteau movies…making me think they’re actually models that Davids enlisted to be in his “happenings”.

Eric Roberts appear in voice over form here playing the older version of Bernie in a performance I can largely describe as “Yawning” (seriously for all the enthusiasm he puts in, he might as well be delivering the lines in between recording Cameo videos) The only performer in this who gets ANYTHING resembling what an Actor SHOULD get in a film is Terrence J. Rotolo as D.B Cooper. And even he isn’t amazing. He shines purely for the total lack of stars in this galaxy of shite. Seriously. This thing is SUCH a waste of harddrive space. I cannot stress that enough.

And finally; the soundtrack. It’s stock music, or at least, it SOUNDS like stock music. Stock music that’s been badly mixed against the on set audio. It’s heavy(ish) rocky sounding music that drowns out all dialogue whenever it’s blaring, has NO connection to the time or place this is supposed to be happening in and genuinely could not feel more “slapped on at the last minute and kicked out the door” than it is. The onsite audios botched too, everything sounds super airy, there’s very little if any ADR or foli work, it’s a sparse show that really does reveal how little effort was put into this production, and just how much contempt the filmmakers had for the audience.

Bigfoot vs D.B Cooper was released on DVD in 2014 by Decoteaus own distribution label “Rapid Heart productions” and it made me laugh because on the spine the films defined as “Sexy Horror”…it’s neither of those things. Extras are fairly sparse, we have a commentary track with David Decoteau and Linnea Quigly in which they basically just openly describe what’s happening on screen (it may as well be an audio description track for all the info you get out of it) and other than that and a trailer reel for Decoteau’s other movies…that’s it. There’s nothing else here. Copies of this are allegedly Region 1 locked. But I had no trouble playing it in my region 2 player soooooooo…it exists.

Bigfoot vs D.B Cooper is a SLOG of a production, a film that would test the patience of even the most reasonable film critic. I honestly don’t know who this feature is for. I don’t know who in their right mind would choose to watch this. it’s anti cinema and the only thing that stops me from full on raging at it is the fact that, Because I KNEW going in that they put nothing into this I can at least partially accept that I shouldn’t have expected anything good to come out of it. Had they set unrealistic expectations i’d have torn this thing a new’un no mistake. But because I know this is one of the flavours of cinema that Decoteau works in, I kind of can’t muster the venom to attack it too hard. This film truly belongs in the “Water is wet, The stove is hot” category of film making. If you KNOW what you’re getting into going into this, then it won’t surprise you to learn the films mostly bullshit. But I weep for anyone who finds this thing with NO idea what they’re letting themselves in for and I can only begin to imagine the pain they’ll find themselves in.

With a non existent script, dead behind the eyes cine and direction, non existent performances and a stocky and poorly mastered score with terrible on set audio. There’s so little here to analyze honestly that I struggled to even categorize what I just experienced. It’s just a terrible picture all round in my opinion and not one I wish to return to.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/bigfoot-vs-db-cooper/1/