Woodchipper Massacre (1988)

Directed by:

Jon McBride

Donna Michelle Productions was a very short-lived indy distributor who pissed off a lot of people during the 80s by releasing some of the absolute worst amateur home video horrors known to man. Their catalogue included such titles as THE ABOMINATION (1986), SPLATTER FARM (1987), the seldom-seen documentary MONSTERS & MANIACS (1988) and this would-be black comedy from the same guy responsible for CANNIBAL CAMPOUT (1988), also a Donna Michelle exclusive. There's no two ways about this one. You'll either find it amusing and endearingly awful or you'll want to rip your hair out one strand at a time from sheer aggravation. Unfortunately, I'm in the second camp. The loud overacting and incessant mugging for the camcorder from the entire obnoxious cast is downright merciless. It just never stops. I found it slightly amusing for about five minutes... And then I just wanted to be put out of my misery.

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Dad (Perren Page) is going to be out of town for business, so he leaves his three kids - eldest son Jon (the director), middle daughter Denice (Denice Edeal) and youngest Tom (Tom Casiello) - in the care of their dear Aunt Tess (Patricia McBride) for the entire weekend. Tess is not only a terrible cook but she's also a fascist, religious nutso bitch who never shuts up and won't let them watch horror movies. She refuses to let grown Jon go on a date. Denice can't even dust a table to her satisfaction. And she forbids little Tom from listening to rock music, demands he clean his pig sty of a room and tries to confiscate his prized Rambo survivalist knife as soon as he gets it in the mail. Not only that, she has a catalogue of annoying bible quotes and old school phrases that constitute the majority of her dialogue.

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During a struggle in the kitchen over the knife, Tom accidentally stabs auntie. The three then decide to dismember her corpse, freeze the body parts and then feed them through a wood chipper in the backyard. So what are they gonna do when Tess' ex-con son Kim (Kim Bailey) shows up looking for his momma and some money? Probably exactly what you think they're gonna do. But will they be able to adequately disposes of two bodies and clean up the yard before dad gets back? The suspense just wasn't killing me and this barely even qualifies as a horror film, let alone a "massacre." I don't really hold that against it, but what I do have a problem with is the fact none of this was particularly clever or funny and it's far too tame to be the outrageous black comedy it so desperately wants to be. The cartoon-like music score is appropriate for the material but the director seems to have coached the cast to scream every one of their lines, likely so the camera's built-in microphone would pick it up.

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Mr. McBride would later form an unholy union with the Polonia Brothers, which would result in such efforts as FEEDERS (1996), FEEDERS 2: SLAY BELLS (1998), BLOOD RED PLANET (2000) and many more. Even though there are thousands of excellent movies out there with no DVD release, this one has one (complete with audio commentary) from the recently revived Camp Motion Pictures.

★1/2

You'll Like My Mother (1972)

Directed by:

Lamont Johnson

Young widow Francesca (Patty Duke) travels via bus to a small, snowbound Minnesota town to visit the mother-in-law her late soldier husband (who was killed during the Vietnam War) was dying to introduce her to before his untimely passing. Immediately upon arriving, Francesca is shocked to find herself greeted with outright cruelty from her husband's bitter, icy mother Katherine Kinsolving (Rosemary Murphy). Mrs. Kinsolving claims she knew nothing of her son's marriage, doesn't hesitate to tell her she's not wanted there, insinuates that all she cares about is money and suggests Francesca, who's very pregnant and about to pop at any moment, give the baby up for adoption! Also living in the home is mute, mentally retarded Kathleen (Sian Barbara Allen), a sister the husband failed to mention even having. Francesca plans to leave as soon as possible and catch the first bus out, but finds herself stranded when her mother-in-law's car won't start. The weather gets worse, the roads are eventually blocked off and she finds herself in a hellish situation with people who may or may not be who they actually claim they are, including Kenny (a pre-Waltons Richard Thomas), a family "cousin" who's lurking in the shadows and might be a rapist and murderer on the lam.

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Francesca's food and drinks are drugged, she's locked up in an upstairs bedroom and finally ends up going into labor. Mrs. Kinsolving, a nurse, helps her during delivery, but claims the baby is stillborn and orders her daughter to dig a hole and bury it in the backyard! Kathleen may not be all there, but she's a good-hearted type who has instead hid the baby in the attic. She also scores a key for the room and gives it to Francesca, so she can sneak out to care for the baby until the snow clears and there's an opportunity for her to escape.

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Based on a then-popular novel by Naomi A. Hintze, adapted for the screen by Jo Heims (who'd just scored with PLAY MISTY FOR ME), this extremely unpleasant but absorbing and compelling psychological horror tale manages to separate itself from similar films in a variety of ways. On the outset, it may remind one most of the 1965 Hammer effort DIE! DIE! MY DARLING! (1965), but it's completely without that film's over-the-top camp appeal contributed mainly by the larger-than-life presence of Tallulah Bankhead. Here, the premise is disturbing and completely plausible. The wintery atmosphere, and the feel of being trapped and isolated, is milked for all its worth and the suspense and tension are both expertly modulated throughout. The sick relationship that unfolds between Mrs. Kinsolving and Kenny is done with a fair amount of tact. Best of all, the director has managed to get four outstanding performances from his actors.

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I just recently gave Duke a hard time for her shrill portrayal of Rosemary in LOOK WHAT'S HAPPENED TO ROSEMARY'S BABY (1976), but she gives a terrific performance in this one. You genuinely feel invested in her character (she's poor, doesn't have a family of her own, has recently lost her husband and now finds herself in this horrible situation) and care about what happens to her and her little baby. Ditto for the little-known Allen (who received a Golden Globe nomination for her work here), who's excellent in a memorable role as the abused Kathleen, a role that requires her to convey everything through unintelligible grunts and facial expressions alone. The usually wholesome Thomas is suprisingly creepy and Murphy is perfection as the ice cold mother-from-hell.

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One minor flaw here is the clumsy use of voice-over narration to convey Francesca's inner thoughts. Though thankfully only used a couple of times, it struck me as being completely unnecessary. Sometimes erroneously listed as a made-for-TV movie, this actually received a limited theatrical release in 1972 via Universal before making its TV debut a year later on NBC.

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★★★1/2

Zodiac Killer, The (1971)

...aka: Zodiac
...aka: Zodiak Killer, The

Directed by:
Tom Hanson

The Zodiac Killer terrorized Northern California in the late 60s / early 70s, claiming at least seven known victims (though he himself claimed thirty-seven) and sending bizarre cryptograms to local newspapers that he demanded be printed or else he'd kill again. To this day, no one has been able to uncover his identity, but the killer and his crimes went on to influence many novels and just as many movies. Everything from the psycho hunted down by Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry (1971) and Brad Dourif's "Gemini Killer" in Exorcist III (1990) to films ranging from David Fincher's big-budget and critically acclaimed Zodiac (2007) to Ulli Lommel's low-budget and critically-panned Zodiac Killer (2005) and Curse of the Zodiac (2007) bear the elusive psycho's mark. However, I believe this film (released to theaters in 1972) was actually the very first to directly address the crimes. Well, unless the porno The Zodiac Rapist, released the same year, somehow beat it to theaters. Interestingly, I've read several places that the producers made this in hopes of helping to catch the real killer; figuring he might frequent the showings and be apprehended! It's fascinating to think about, and I'd say it's pretty likely that the real killer (who kept in contact with the police until the later part of the 70s) did go see this at least once for a laugh. Hey, if someone made a movie about you, could you resist seeing it?

To wipe away any doubt that this is just a cheap, sensationalist attempt to cash in on tragedy (nice try), this opens with a letter from an honest to goodness San Francisco Chronicle reporter telling us that some of the scenes and dialogue may "seem strange and unreal" but the film's goal "is not to win commercial awards but to create an 'awareness of present danger.'" And to be fair, some scenes accurately depict the actual case, such as the how some of the murders are committed, the notes to the press, the cross / circle symbol, the killer writing on a car door and a couple of other elements. The rest is a mixture of gritty, taut murder scenes mixed with terrible amateur acting, some truly mean-spirited (yet hilariously delivered) dialogue and a psychological profile on what type of person the nutjob might be. Apparently the makers of this film speculate it's either an impotent, rabbit-loving mail carrier or a wig-wearing over-the-hill gigolo.

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The younger of the two suspects, Jerry (Hal Reed), is a moody mailman who shrugs off female companionship to chill with his pet bunnies. The older one, Grover (Bob Jones), is a truck driver who is behind on his rent, hates his ex-wife with a passion, is extremely insecure about both his occupation and being bald and has a long criminal record. Grover lies about being a businessman and wears a wig to try to attract ladies with little success. During one scene, his date rips off his wife and angrily screams "I never met a bald-headed bastard I could trust!" Jerry just ain't all that interested. Grover wants split custody of his daughter and runs to the garage to get a hack saw when he's fighting with the ex. Jerry gets upset that rabbit stew is being served in a diner and carries around a fake rubber nose (?) in his travel bag. One of these fellas is the killer, but who is it? Your question will be answered sooner than you think at around the midway point. After that, the psycho basically just continues his murder spree and kneels down at a shrine while proclaiming "I am the Supreme Zodiac!"

A pair of detectives; Sgt. Tom Pittman (Ray Lynch) and Officer Ken Heller (played by, uh, Tom Pittman) investigate. The victims are mostly shot, but one couple are tied-up and stabbed, a guy has his ear cut off and an unfortunate elderly lady is hit over the head with a tire and then crushed when a car is dropped on her! Can't say that I was ever bored while watching this. In fact, I laughed. A lot. Not sure if that was the director's intention or not, but some of the sick humor is obviously intentional. The cast includes comedian Doodles Weaver, future Oscar-winning screenwriter Robert Towne (credited as "Robert Tubin") sitting at the bar and Richard Garrison (who later starred in The Crater Lake Monster).

The DVD is from Something Weird, who have paired it with THE SEX KILLER (1965) and ZERO IN AND SCREAM (1971) for their "Sharpshooter Triple Bill." Both of the other films also feature serial killers, but lean more toward "roughie" sexploitation than horror, while Zodiac has no sex and no nudity.

★★

Uninvited (1987)

Directed by:
Greydon Clark

I have a couple of cats of my own and it seems like I'm constantly cleaning gunk up off the floor that's left behind by my furry little buddies. The fluffy orange kitty in UNINVITED has a similar problem... but instead of hacking up hairballs or excess food, it occassionally goes buck wild and pukes up a tiny-but-deadly mutant creature that's taking refuge inside its belly! Why? Dunno. But it did escape from a government research lab and the scientists there mention cancer research, which we horror fans know always spells trouble. As the cat runs around, some other shady things are going on at a resort area during Spring Break. A trio of murderous criminals; hard-assed grump Mike (George Kennedy), womanizer Walter (Alex Cord) and goofy drunk Albert (Clu Gulager, with a set of oversized dentures) swindle three million dollars and plot to get away on a yacht to be captained by a one-woman crew named Rachel (Toni Hudson). A couple of oblivious young bimbos - Suzanne (Shari Shattuck) and Bobbie (Clare Carey) - end up catching Walter's eye and he invites them to come along on the trip. The ladies, in turn, invite three other guys; Corey (Rob Estes) and Lance (Beau Dremann) and brainy Martin (Eric Larson), and right before they get on board the ship, they find the cat. Suzanne instantly falls in love with it and insist it come along, too. Mr. Kennedy isn't too happy about any of this. But then again, he never is.
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Tensions mount between the criminals and the others after an attempted rape and things just get worse when mutant kitty starts attacking and killing everyone off one by one. Even a scratch from the little sucker leads to a nasty and fatal infection where the wounds pulsate and explode. Surprisingly, all this somehow managed to secure a PG-13 rating. Though there's no nudity or over-the-top profanity, the film does have enough violence and blood to seriously put its rating into question. Veins swell and squirt blood, fingers are bitten off, a face is melted off with hot steam and a neck and ankle get chewed up real good. Of the three veterans in the cast, two make an early exit, but Kennedy is pretty hilarious while he's around. Shattuck (previously seen in DEATH SPA) also seems to be having fun. Strangely, the two worst actors end up being the last two standing. Boo on that.
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Still, for 80s cheese movie fans, the premise and handpuppet cat creature alone merit this a look. Director Clark (who also wrote, produced and has a cameo during the opening sequence) might not be a genre luminary, but he does come up with some amusingly absurd concepts (see also: SATAN'S CHEERLEADERS and WITHOUT WARNING). Austin Stoker appears in a small role. Dick Warlock and Spice Williams were stunt performers.
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★ SBIG

Escape from the Insane Asylum (1986)

...aka: Night of Horror

Directed by:
Felix Girard

Wealthy, sane Chris Nilsen (Renee Harmon) is being held in a loony bin against her will. Her unfaithful husband Alex (Henry Lewis) and his evil associate Dr. Seymour Harper (Frank Neuhaus), are basically keeping her prisoner there so they can use her money to fund their experiments, which involve unorthodox brain operations on the mentally retarded. Chris' attorney manages to get her out and she rents a country home owned by her former doctor. She's quickly befriended by Harper's wife Ellen (Lynn Whitmire) and it's revealed the home's previous occupant, Inez (Susette Andres), was the husband's former mistress, whom he murdered. It doesn't take long for Chris to start hearing and seeing things, some of which have been planted there by her husband and Harper specifically to drive her bonkers. But I doubt they'd have bothered wasting their time if they knew the place actually already was haunted. A rocking chair rocks by itself, footsteps, voices and sounds of someone cooking are heard, broken dishes disappear off the floor and eventually Chris sees transparent, ghostly visions of Inez, who's hanging out in limbo until she gets justice for her murder.

Just when you don't think it can get any more complicated, a nutter named Paul Peterson (Steven Neuhardt) slashes an orderlies neck, escapes from the asylum and is lurking around the house wearing a black hood. Paul's mother Celeste (Arline Specht) just so happens to be a powerful psychic who helps Chris find out what's going on with help from a ouija board and her friendly ancient spirit guide Julian (!?) If that's not enough for ya, Chris' teenage stepdaughter Becky (Lauren Brent) and her army of big-haired friends go to a party where a New Wave band performs, all try to squeeze into a small hot tub and plan to visit a reputably haunted old farmhouse. Despite some unintentional laughs here and there, especially the opening asylum scenes full of cliched nuttish behavior, it's mostly just dull, inept and confusing. The acting's pretty awful, the story's all over the place and it's mostly just talk and very, very tame. Even the skeleton prop dummy at the end doesn't help alleviate the boredom.

Released in Australia on the Palace Explosive Video label, this extremely obscure shot-on-video effort is noteworthy mainly for the campy presence of Renee Harmon, who speaks in a thick German accent and has some of the strangest and most stilted line delivery in history. Not only an actress, acting and screenwriting teacher and author of five movie-oriented books, Ms. Harmon (who passed away in 2006) also produced and/or wrote a handful of her own starring vehicles throughout the 70s and 80s, including FROZEN SCREAM (1975), LADY STREET FIGHTER (1978; released 1980), THE EXECUTIONER PART II (1984), HELL RIDERS (1984) and the still-unreleaed JUNGLE TRAP (1986). This is another one she both wrote and produced... None too well on any count.

NO STARS!

Escapes (1986)

Directed by:
David Steensland

Young Matthew (Todd Fulton) receives a mysterious videotape in the mail titled, you guessed it, ESCAPES. Hey, it stars Vincent Price, he figures, so how bad can it possibly be? As it turns out, pretty damn bad. A camera goes through a long corridor with plaster people protruding from the walls and ends up focusing on Mr. Price sitting at a table. He informs us we're about to see six tales of the supernatural and then we're off. "A Little Fishy" concerns a man who goes from fishing to being fished. Not. Clever. "Coffee Break" concerns an obnoxious delivery boy (Michael Patton-Hall) who gets lost on some back roads around a tiny town called Harmony; population 29. When he stops to ask an old man (John Mitchum) for directions, he's told to stop at a diner on his way out for a cup of coffee. The delivery guy refuses and notices that no matter which road he takes he always ends up back at the same place... "Who's There" is about a man (Ken Thorley) who encounters playful ape monsters while out jogging through the woods. Next up is "Jonah's Dream," which ironically gave me a little escape of my own last night when I fell asleep trying to watch it.

After some much-needed shut eye, I decided to go ahead and finish. Hey, maybe I was just too grumpy and tired last night to find something to appeciate here. Turns out I was wrong... There actually is nothing to appreciate here. "Jonah's Dream" - the tale of a widowed, financially-strapped gold prospector's wife (Shirley O'Key) who finds some spaceship in a abandoned mine - was just as dull as what had preceeded it. "Think Twice," which involves a big city bum (Gil Reade) finding a magical, red-glowing crystal that helps him get revenge on a mugger (Rocky Capella), is strictly ho-hum. Things wrap up with "Hall of Faces," which tells the fate of Matthew and "The Mailman" (Price). Here we finally, get an imaginative twist that doesn't come off like third rate imitation of a Twilight Zone episode, but it's too little, too late.

The five tales sandwiched in the middle (which were used as program filled on both HBO and the Sci-Fi Channel while they were still in their infancy) and the linking footage run just 69 minutes. For the record, I did not see the "director's cut" which apparently adds sixteen minutes of new footage. Supposedly Price was paid 10 thousand dollars for his participation in this, so hopefully he was able to put that to good use.

★1/2

La rebelión de las muertas (1972)

... aka: Rebellion of the Dead
... aka: Rebellion of the Dead Women
... aka: Revolt of the Dead Ones
... aka: Vengeance of the Zombies
... aka: Walk of the Dead

Directed by:
León Klimovsky

Oh, Paul Naschy. I like ya and everything, but sometimes you just bite off more than you can chew. Here we have the bones of a fine little voodoo / zombie exploitation movie, with a handful of well-directed and surprisingly potent shock scenes, some of the brightest, most amusingly gaudy colors this side of H.G. Lewis and just enough blood and nudity to please the target audience (Eurotrash enthusiasts). But it really could have been so much better and at the end of the day the debits mainly fall into Mr. Naschy's corner... and I'm not just talking about him being hilariously cast as an East Indian mystic wearing a bad wig under his turban, either. That I can actually live with. What I couldn't deal with is the unfocused and woefully convoluted screenplay provided to us by the star/writer. An irritatingly inappropriate score provided by Juan Carlos Calderón certainly doesn't help matters.

In London, a masked, caped serial killer is on the loose and his female victims don't seem to stay dead for very long. After her father is hung, another relative is axed in the face and zombified cousin Gloria (Norma Kastel) attacks her in her bedroom one night, Elvire Irving (Romy) comes to the conclusion it's probably best to hop a train and split town a.s.a.p. While a male acquaintance, Lawrence Redgrave ("Vic Winner"/ Víctor Alcázar), stays to assist Scotland Yard detectives Hawkins (Antonio Pica) and Basehart (Ramón Lillo), Elvire decides to go stay in a country home owned by Krisna (Naschy), a peaceful Hindu mystic whose teachings she's recently become infatuated with. Also living there are black chaffeur Ti Zachary (Pierre Besari), maids Elsie (Maria Kosty) and Susan (Elsa Zabala) and Krisna's assistant and lover Kala (Catherine Zeta Jones look-a-like Mirta Miller), who feels threatened by the new woman in the house.

It is eventually revealed that the psycho who's running around London killing people is Krisna's brother, Katanka (also played by Naschy). Katanka raped and murdered a woman in India, was hunted down by some visiting Brits and then was torched in his home. Now with a burned face, Katanka wants revenge against those who tried to kill him by turning the family's most beautiful daughters into zombies that help assist him in killing the others. He also utilizes wax voodoo dolls to control people or make them kill themselves. There are too many incidental characters and the film just plods along from one incoherent scene to the next until deciding to finally start making sense an hour plus into the movie.

But it's all very vividly photographed (by Francisco Sánchez) and there are some great scenes in here that make it worth watching. My favorite bit is a nightmare sequence where Elvire envisions herself as sacrifice during a black mass ritual complete with a chicken getting its head cut off, zombies rising from their coffins and a horned Satan (Naschy once again). There's also a great scene where a train station worker (Luis Ciges) is forced to cut his own throat and a memorable decaptitation. The zombie make-up is more in line with pale voodoo zombies instead of the rotting zombies we normally see today. Also in the cast are Aurora de Alba (the vampire woman from FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR) as a nude victim / future muerta and Montserrat Julió and Fernando Sánchez Polack as grave robbers.

Released in a cut version several times on VHS (through All Seasons Entertainment, Vogue Video, etc.), the uncensored DVD release from Deimos (a beautiful print of the film which comes with an intro from Naschy and other cool features) is pretty much the only way to go now.

★★