What horror/sci-fi films have you been watching?

THE DEVONSVILLE TERROR (1983) - 300 years after townies killed three witches, the citizens of Devonsville feels that crusading urge again when three new women (an environmentalist, a deejay, a schoolteacher) move into the community. Teacher Jenny (Suzanna Love) finds only local stud Matthew (Robert Walker Jr.) to be a willing dating prospect, which is bad because his ancestors were the ones who organized the witch killings. Meanwhile, Dr. Warley (Donald Pleasence) investigates the town's history to cure himself of the curse of having worms crawl out of his skin (really).

This was another childhood viewing that holds up as well as one would expect an 80s Ulli Lommel flick could. This flick is just plain weird at points though and full of bizarre scenes like when Paul Willson shows up at Jenny's house and gives this long rant about love before playing his violin. Lead Love was married to Lommel at the time (and apparently writing the checks) with both players fresh off the success of THE BOOGEYMAN (1980). She is probably the main appeal here. The end is pretty amusing as Jenny is revealed to be a witch with superpowers and she causes heads to roll, explode and melt. Then she splits town, with her relationship with Matthew left with no resolution and a guy trying to ape Pleasence's voice doing a voice over. Pretty sure Pleasence did one day of filming as all of his scenes are shot in the same room and he is wearing the same outfit. Filmed in Wisconsin, this had Bill Rebane working on the production and captures some gorgeous fall foliage. Not to be confused with THE DUNWICH HORROR.

ALTERED (2006) - I really liked this one. At some point I'll probably do an informal top ten list of what I think the best dtv movies are, of the ones I've seen -- this one will make it.

MASSIVE SPOILERS


Has one good idea, but it's a great idea -- what if some people who were abducted by aliens actually fought back? Good portrayal of rednecks, a thing with me because I grew up in redneckville and get tired of seeing them always presented as the ignorant comic relief or the scary freak or, well, both. Nice to see some modulated types. Setting very restricted but it absolutely makes sense, given the setup (rednecks out to capture an alien actually manage to capture one, surprising everyone, including themselves). Generally well acted, supporting Doug's Pet Theory #1

The general level of acting is getting better.

Gets gloppy and silly, but I think I want an alien invader from outer space movie to be at least a lilttle gloppy and silly, don't you? Ends with a real straight up deus ex machina, but well, I'll forgive them that. And it's at least cathartic.

Suggests to me that FROM DUSK TIL DAWN is a key movie of the last fifteen years or so, as I continually stumble across movies obviously influenced by it. Check it out, worth a look, much better than many in this catagory.

The Severed Arm
a group of friends go on a cave exploration trip. a quick cave in leaves them stranded for weeks. they talk about how to survive and soon enough they decide to draw straws... the shortest straw gets his arms cut off so the other can use it as food. after some procrastination, they finally cut off an arm and IMMEDIATELY after the arm is off, rescuers come knocking.
five years later, it looks like the guy who got his arm cut off is back for revenge.

i have loved this movie since i first saw it as a young boy. the dvd is one of those cheapie budget titles, doubled with Good Versus Evil, so its not in any sort of good quality.
VERY SMALL SPOILER








there are some spots with sloppy editing that kind of steal some of the suspense, but then there are other spots, like when the killer is crashing through the window at the radio station to kill the radio dj, that are pretty cool and reminded me of an Argento death scene.
A+ excellent movie with one of the best twist endings ever.

This post has been edited by Ed Black on Nov 29 2009, 10:04 AM

I've always enjoyed this one, too. Unfortunately, as far as I know, all the budget DVD releases of this title are from an edited tv-print. Only the old Video Gems tape is uncut.

THE SEVERED ARM is successful much of the time, mostly because of one-time director Thomas Alderman's skill behind the camera, keeping it fluid and pointing at something interesting, even though he obviously wasn't able to shoot many takes. It's never quite as lurid as its title indicates, but it doesn't waste time with excess characterization and subplots, and it builds to an effectively sick climax.

Oh man, my sister and I saw this on TV as little kids and it freaked us out. But we both thought it was funny that the guy with the glasses from ALICE was in it. I know I have a set with this somewhere it in. I'll have to bust it out.

As for me, I revisited the "classic"

SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT 5: THE TOYMAKER (1991) - Young Derek Quinn (William Thorne) sees his father killed by a killer toy that someone left on their doorstep. Two weeks later, his mom has completely recovered from her husband's death but Derek is taking it hard, refusing to speak. She thinks the best way to cheer him up is take him to a toy store run by Joe Petto (Mickey Rooney) and his son Pino (Brian Bremer). But Mr. Petto has some evil up his sleeve as he just might be the one responsible for making these deadly toys. Also, some handsome stranger (Tracy Fraim, yes, he's a dude with that name) is poking around the Quinn household.

Producer Brian (RE-ANIMATOR) Yuzna directed the fourth entry in this series and produced here. Both sequels tried to keep the Xmas horror theme but move away from the killer Santa angle. With the killer toy angle here, this is the HALLOWEEN III of the SNDN series and you would suspect to see Charles Band's name somewhere in the credits. Alas, he wasn't involved but I'm sure he enjoyed this though. Of course, how can you not enjoy a movie that features Mickey Rooney drunk on Jack Daniels and smashing the bottle over his son's head? There are some great FX in here from Screaming Mad George with the killer toys being Larry the Larva, a car with saw blades, a strangling Santa ball and the required Army men who fire real bullets. What no killer teddy bear? Charles Band shakes his head in shame. The acting is fine by everyone and the little kid actually gives one of the better child performances I've seen (maybe because he has no dialog?). Yuzna gets extra points for having a guy in line with his son to see Santa wearing a RE-ANIMATOR shirt and a girl on Santa's lap asking for clothes, make-up, sunglasses and a tape of BRIDE OF RE-ANIMATOR. Clint Howard has a small role as a shopping mall Santa.

EDIT: I should have mentioned director Martin Kitrosser had a hand in some of the early FRIDAY THE 13TH movies and has been Tarantino's script supervisor on all of his films.

Also, star Rooney once infamously wrote a letter of protest about the first SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT when it was in theaters. 7 years later he is headlining the final entry. I wonder if he made the connection or if they kept him in the dark and just called this THE TOYMAKER while he was on set?

SNDN parts 3-5 will be officially released on DVD in a set the first week in December.

Trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDLLVtYn6k0

This post has been edited by William S. Wilson on Nov 29 2009, 11:38 AM

THE SILENT SCREAM (1980) - Checked out the new Scorpion DVD of this cult item (first time seeing it) and rather enjoyed it. It builds slowly and doesn't rely on much splatter (there's a small amount, though)--very atypical of the 1980 slice & dice scene. In fact, if you remove what little gore there is, along with the brief nudity by star Rebecca Balding, this almost plays like a solid TV-movie of its time, and I mean that in a good way. Audiences jaded by today's constant surprise endings might be disappointed in the way that the plot runs its course and how the film simply ends, but it still works. And it seems almost quaint to watch this in almost 2010.

Balding, the future star of THE BOOGENS, is an appealing lead, but most of the younger actors get outshined by their more experienced elders. Even cashing easy paychecks, folks like Cameron Mitchell and Yvonne DeCarlo are solid pros, and comedian Avery Schreiber is surprisingly alright in a completely straight role as Detective Mitchell's partner. Everyone, however, takes a back seat to Barbara Steele's outstanding work that is certainly one of the icon's finest roles.

It's too bad this wasn't remade about ten years ago. Jason Schwartzman could've played the creepy young Mason, and a curly-wigged Jason Alexander could've been Avery Schreiber! With Michael Richards as Cameron Mitchell!

BORN OF FIRE (1983) - I think it might be a little hard to give an accurate plot synopsis for this one, but here goes - flautist Paul (Peter Firth) is contacted by an astronomer (Suzan Crowley, her character billed simply as The Woman) and told he must go to Turkey to uncover the reason for his father's immolation death at the hands of the Master Musician. One thing is for sure about this hypnotic horror film is you will NEVER see anything else like it. Director Jamil Dehlavi creates lots of surreal bits and films in some astounding locations in Turkey. Firth and Crowley are both excellent in their roles. Special mention should also go to Nabil Shaban, a deformed man who is given a surprise sympathetic role. While the plot won't set the cinematic world on fire, the imagery more than makes up for it as it is like watching a dream unfold on your TV. I watched the VHS of this but Mondo Macabro just released it in a special edition DVD. They compare it favorably to the works of Alejandro Jodorowsky and I'm inclined to agree.

For anyone interested, here is the highlight from SNDN5:

Mickey Rooney is drunk and violent

I am on my knees begging each and every one of you to listen to Rooney's incredibly gonzo audio commentary on his TWILIGHT ZONE episode. I'm pretty sure "drunk" and "violent" are the words that describe it too.

INVASION FROM INNER EARTH (1974) aka HELL FIRE aka THEY - B-movie nerd confession time - I've never seen a Bill Rebane production. And after this abomination, I'm not sure if I want to see another one! Strange gas erupts from the earth and mysterious red lights appear out of nowhere, causing the world's population to slowly die off as this unknown menace moves from the North & South Poles toward the equator. The main part of the story focuses on 5 folks in the woods and how they deal with the situation. How? By talking...and talking...and talllllllking. Somehow one guy into UFOs lets everyone else know it is UFOs because, well, he is into UFOs and knows aliens from Mars moved into Earth's core 8,000 years ago. Good lord Rebane, what are you thinking? Even if this has a germ of a good idea, the execution is so terrible that nothing can be forgiven. Not even the cool, snowbound setting. I can take cheap any ol' day, but not cheap and boring. The only thing that kept me amused was that this uses the same theme from James Bryan's LADY STREET FIGHTER. Well, I was amused until I remembered that theme was stuck in my head for weeks after LSF and now it will be stuck again.

And miss out on Rebane's THE GIANT SPIDER INVASION? IMO, by far the most entertaining (and watchable) of his films.

Well Will, INNER EARTH is Rebane's worst, so if you made it through that one...

Well leave it to me to start at the bottom! I'll give him one more chance with GIANT SPIDER since it is easily available on DVD.

And you GOTTA watch BLOOD HARVEST with Tiny Tim!

METALSTORM: THE DESTRUCTION OF JARED-SYN (1983) - Dogen (Jeffrey Byron) is hellbent on killing Jared-Syn (THE ROAD WARRIOR's Michael Preston) for reasons we are never fully given (he is some sort of tyrant but never does anything evil until after Dogen declares he must be stopped). Teaming with Rhodes (Tim Thomerson) and Dyanna (Kelly Preston), Dogen journeys into the wasteland of the Lost City to stop Jared-Syn from using some evil crystal.

Director Charles Band followed up PARASITE, his first successful foray into the 3-D world, with this futuristic action-adventure film. It is pretty obvious he is going for a mix of THE ROAD WARRIOR and STAR WARS, but I'm not entirely sure it is successful and at times comes off looking more like MEGAFORCE. The action is good though and the film moves at a quick clip. I'm sure the 3-D was pretty impressive in the theater as all sorts of objects are chucked at the screen. There is also one psychedelic, TRON-inspired bit during the end chase that probably had audiences puking dayglo in the aisles. The acting is good though for a b-movie with Thomerson doing his best Han Solo and Richard Moll showing up as a leader of a group of Cyclops. The film "ends" with the most laughable cliffhanger where Jared-Syn gets away (so the title lied!) and Dogen vows, "I'll find him in another dimension one day." Huh? Obviously Band was hoping this would be a series but poor box office returns from a Universal theatrical distribution vetoed that idea and he moved on to start Empire Pictures (which kicked off production with THE DUNGEONMASTER, again starring Byron). Now if only someone could tell me what the hell METALSTORM means.

METALSTORM trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vk1sdBIi53Q

Ha! I remember this trailer playing in front of Jaws 3-D ("You mean we talkin' about some damn shark's mutha?") and the audience, primed and panting for any trashy 3-D gimmick, whooped it up with every thing that was projected out at them. I loved it too, even though I knew at that relatively young age that I wanted nothing to do with Metalstorm.

Ha! I remember this trailer playing in front of Jaws 3-D ("You mean we talkin' about some damn shark's mutha?") and the audience, primed and panting for any trashy 3-D gimmick, whooped it up with every thing that was projected out at them. I loved it too, even though I knew at that relatively young age that I wanted nothing to do with Metalstorm.

Oh, William, you poor boy, how could you have so cavalierly passed up the genius of METALSTORM? The plot is incomprehensible, the special effects shoddy, the photography murky, the climax completely confusing. What I'm saying is, METALSTORM is great!

I saw this in the theater, and I was thinking to myself it was probably the first 3D movie I saw, until you reminded me that JAWS 3D came out first. I also own METALSTORM on VHS. Where is the DVD, Charles Band??