Deadly Love (1987)

Directed by:
Michael O'Rourke

Here's another relic of the 80s when they'd release, well, pretty much anything that would fill up video store shelves. This one was distributed by Complete Entertainment on VHS (there is no DVD release as of this writing) and is from the director of the equally obscure - and equally lousy - campground slasher flick MOON STALKER (1988). The place: Pine Grove, Nevada. The time: 1965. High schooler Annie Butler (Cassie Brown) is in love with bad boy biker Buddy (Mark Oglesby). Her millionaire father isn't too happy about it, but even his threats to send her off to a boarding school in Switzerland if she continues seeing him aren't enough to keep the star-crossed lovers apart. To make matters worse, Clint (Jim Alves), the creepy caretaker on the Butler farm, is also obsessively in love with Annie to the point where he carves her name on his palm with a pocket knife. On the eve when Annie and Buddy plan to run away together, Clint shoots Buddy dead with a shotgun in front of Annie and her father. The father instructs him to hide the motorcycle, bury the body and forget about it.

Twenty-some years later, Annie (hilariously aged via a baaaaad make-up job) still lives on the same farm, still listens to the same 45 of her and Buddy's song and still pines for her dead lover. Her father is dead and neighborhood kids who get bored in their small town "fucking shithole" frequently harass her. Using a magic mirror spell from "The Encylopedia of Ancient and Forbidden Knowledge," Annie has been able to keep in contact with Buddy's ghost all of these years, but that isn't enough to give her the will to keep going so she slits her wrists in the bathtub. Annie's niece Hillie (Eileen Hart), the sole heir of the Butler property, comes to take ownership. Instead of selling it, she decides to move in. She becomes acquainted with friendly local delivery boy Skip (Buddy Reynolds), who was a friend and protector of Annie's, has to deal with the same punks who terrorized her aunt and also has ghostly encounters with the undead biker.

This slow, tedious bore doesn't have enough plot for a feature film so it resorts to constant flashbacks containing footage we've already seen. In fact, some shots are reused five or six times to push this up to feature length (it runs about 80 minutes total). The acting is terrible, the characters are obnoxious, there's not much violence or gore and the film isn't even very exploitative. It's also not even unintentionally funny, aside from supporting actress Brown's post-stroke-like line delivery and the insanely huge curly wig the leading lady is forced to wear. And don't even get me started on the big "surprise twist" at the end or the treacly theme song "Forever" (sung by Becka Ragel) which is repeated about ten times throughout the film.

Some sources claim this was shot-on-video, but it doesn't really look like it. Other sources claim it was shot-on-video then transferred to film before the video release, which sounds more accurate to me. Either way, good luck making it to the end 80s SOV fans.

★

Sex with a Stranger (1986)

Directed by:
"Cris" (Chris) Monte

Here's the hardcore spoofof Agatha Christie's Ten Little Indians you've been waiting up nights for. After receiving a note and half of a thousand dollar bill in the mail, seven strangers are lured to a remote mansion. No host is there to greet them but whoever it is has left a note asking them to spend the night and promises that he or she will reveal their identity in the morning. Until then, what are seven adults in an adult movie supposed to do? If you guessed play charades or watch TV, you would be wrong. First, let's meet our roster of suspects. First up is famous model Priscilla Vogue (Nina Hartley), who has been promised the cover of Glamour magazine if she shows up. Failed actor Trevor Fairbanks (Greg Derek) received half a script with the promise of a film role attached upon arrival. Dr. Rivameter (Keisha) - phD in poetry - received an invitation to a golf tournament. Clothing inspector Inspector #6 (Scott Irish) is told he can become Inspector #1. Prostitute Sugar (Ebony Ayes) and obnoxious hustler / shyster Sylvester "Slick" Rhodes (Randy West) both came just for the money. Joy (Sheena Horne) doesn't seem to have an identity but already had a thirteen minute long pre-opening-credit solo scene - which will try to patience of even the most avid porn watcher - so I guess that's not really important.

In between all of the sex scenes people begin mysteriously turning up dead. Inspector #6 is pushed down the stairs and Priscilla's vibrator short circuits ("She must have got electrocuted with the, uh, vibrator stuck in her pussy!") After Trevor drinks some poison wine, Joy turns to the female doctor and says in a monotone "You know, it just occurred to me that I don't really know you. It's like... you're a stranger" before the obligatory lesbian scene... which takes place on the same bed where two corpses lie! There's also an off-screen drowning, a spike through the head and a knife stuck in a back. It all leads up to a surprise ending. It's cheap (and shot-on-video, naturally), silly, has a few dumb laughs and there's lots of sex, so mission accomplished, I guess.

The video was released by AVC (Adult Video Corporation) and it's also on DVD on most adult sites. I did find a VHS box scan but it's too graphic to post here on this blog.

★★

Le démon dans l'île (1983)

... aka: Demon Is on the Island, The
... aka: Demon of the Island

Directed by:
Francis Leroi

Ever cut yourself shaving? Yeah, me too. How about twice in the same shave? Hey, we all get a little rushed sometimes. Ever cut yourself so badly that instead of using specks of toilet paper you had to use a bath towel to sop up all the blood? Can't say that I have, but so begins this French horror-mystery, which turned out to be much better than I had anticipated. Why didn't I expect much? For starters, the few reviews I could find online were very mixed. However, the primary reason I set my expectations low was because this was made by Francis Leroi, who is best known for making several of the lesser entries in the long-running EMMANUELLE soft core porn series; parts IV and VI, as well as a long-running 1993 series which frequently played on cable TV and make up the bulk of his filmography. Seldom seen outside of its home country and never released in America, Le démon dans l'île ("Demon of the Island" or "The Demon Is on the Island") successfully plays upon one's fears of common everyday objects found in most homes. I know I can't be the only person out there who's watched my micro meal slowly spinning around in the oven and wondering what would happen if I accidentally left my fork on the plate. Or sticking my hand down the garbage disposal hoping the thing doesn't automatically start up.

After the aforementioned messy shaving accident, chain-smoking doctor Gabrielle Martin (Anny Duperey) arrives on a small, picturesque island. She's been hired to replace the town's doctor and thinks the small community and isolation will do her some good (she just recently lost her husband and young son in a car accident). After being introduced around by the mayor (Pierre Santini) and his secretary (Cerise) and moving into her new home, Gabrielle discovers the physician she was supposed to replace - the mysterious Dr. Paul Henry Marshall (Jean-Claude Brialy) - is still there and still seeing patients. He even seems to be beating her to all of her house calls. When she questions why she's even been called there, she's told that nobody in the village trusts the current doctor. If that isn't weird enough, common household items seem to be mutilating (or killing) people in freak accidents, while somehow also infecting them with a strange disease. Gabrielle, who initially wants to leave the island, is drawn in to the mystery and decides to start investigating on her own. Upon realizing all of the items which malfunctioned were purchased from the same supermarket, she decides to camp out there for the evening to discover just what's going on. And the results may surprise you. They did me!

This is an entertaining, well-made film which manages to generate a good deal of intrigue and suspense before the finale and has several genuinely creepy moments. One of the key scenes here, taking place after the household-appliances-gone-berserk theme has been well-established, focuses in on a family of three doing everyday things (a father takes apart the TV and works on it, the young daughter shaves carrots, uses a dicer and a juicer and the mother uses a can opener, a gas stove and an oven) as we just sit back and wait for something horrible to happen! Other scenes involve a coffee pot exploding and scalding a woman's face, an electric carving knife slicing off fingers (after the father hilarious warns the son not to play with it), a drum-playing toy monkey poking out a little girls eyeball, a propane tank exploding and blowing up a boat with two naked teenagers on it and a champagne glass busting in someone's mouth.

I have seen this (erroneously, I think) listed as having been made for TV, but I doubt it. Either way, definitely don't let the stigma of 'made for TV' put you off from seeing it. The production values are up to snuff with theatrical releases of its time and (unlike older American films which were made for television) it contains blood, a little gore, profanity and even some nudity. It's handsomely photographed by Jacques Assuérus and often utilizes lovely seaside locations. In addition, the entire cast (particularly the two leads) put in very good - if not excellent - performances.

Currently, Demon has fewer than 100 votes on IMDb, but it deserves more viewers. It won awards at the Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival and Fantasporto but has never been released on video or DVD in America either dubbed or subtitled; the version I watched was a fairly good-quality TV print, which had custom made English fansubs. Some of the medical talk isn't quite dumbed down enough for people like me, but I guess it's not that big of deal googling stuff like "neuroendocrinian disease."

★★★

Dead Silence (1989)

Directed by:
Hugh Gallagher

Here's the exact type of cheap-o video I absolutely love reviewing here: Hardly anyone has ever seen this sucker! The film was available through mail order only back in the day, has never been released to DVD and, as of this writing, is not even listed on IMDb. I cannot locate any poster artwork or a VHS sleeve for it... granted there even was any poster artwork or a VHS box... and there is nary a review anywhere online for it. Written, produced and directed by Draculina magazine publisher Hugh Gallagher, this extremely obscure shot-on-video cheapie was made prior to Gallagher's straight-to-VHS "erotic gore" trilogy, which kicked off with 1990's low-budget-gore-and-nudity soaked GORGASM. The opening sequence of Dead Silence takes place in a prison. Since this film has a budget that didn't extend far beyond purchasing blank VHS tapes to load into the camcorder, the "prison" is basically just a white room probably located in some office building. There, an obese judge (Flint Mitchell) shows devil-worshipping serial killer and death row prisoner Sam Mason (Brad Foltz) compassion by informing him "See you in hell" as he's strapped to an electric chair. The prisoner seethes back, "You can count on it!" before receiving a lethal dosage of electricity.

Not long after, our bleached-and-feathered heroine Terri (Cindy Weichbrodt) is busy typing away on a computer, possibly working on this film's credits, which were taped directly off a computer screen. The executed man sneaks into her home and attacks her roommate. Being the wonderful roomie she is, she hides in her closet and watches the psycho tazer her friend unconscious, fill a bottle with her blood and then stab her to death. Oh wait, that's all just a nightmare! Whew. The psycho then pops up from behind her chair and slashes her throat. Oh wait, it's just a nightmare-inside-of-a-nightmare. Fooled again! Terri is the reporter whose investigation helped put psycho Sam behind bars. Her boss Neil (Ron Scroggins) wants a follow-up story and watching a TV program called "Super Natural" gives her an idea. How about she go to Sam's grave, put a tape recorder on it and try to record audio of Sam's restless spirit? Sure, why not. Terri goes to the cemetery, sets up the recorder on the grave and the decides to take a nap in her car.

Grave-digger Martin (Kevin Patterson), who's apparently been living in his car, stumbles upon the recorder, plays the tape and then manages to get himself possessed by Sam's spirit. He then spends the rest of the movie chasing Terri through the woods, first in his car and then by foot. A young couple tryin' to get lucky get unlucky as the possessed psycho runs into them and the boss goes to see a carnival psychic (played by the director's wife, Paula Gallagher), who talks about how Sam may have completed a Satanic ritual sacrifice of 13 people before dying, which would give his spirit immortality.

Probably around 99.5 percent of the movie going public is going to find nearly everything about this one to be pathetic and laughable. And if one doesn't have an affinity for unintentional laughs, most are going to be downright bored. I've seen a lot of bad acting in my day, but this movie may contain the absolute worst and most wooden "acting" I've ever come across in one of these things. To the film and director's credit, there IS a genuine attempt to build up excitement. They get to wreck a car and a motorcycle and there are even some minor stunts here (performed by Patterson). There's also a fair amount of blood; including neck slashings, a hand getting ripped off and a decapitation. That said, these scenes are usually staged and photographed so ineptly that they're rendered completely ineffectual. I couldn't really tell just what in the hell happened to our heroine at the end, either.

Some people seek out movies simply because they're obscure. Dead Silence is for those people and no one else. The running time is just 62 minutes.

★1/2