Sex Wish (1976)

... aka: Love Wish
... aka: Night Walker, The
... aka: Wish

Directed by:
"Tim McCoy" (Victor Milt)

Lawyer Kenneth Bradshaw (Harry Reems) has just returned from vacation in Japan. He goes to visit his fiancee Faye (C.J. Laing) and after a ten minute romp in the bathtub and on bed, he leaves early in the morning to work on some briefs. On his way out, he bumps into a strange man carrying a briefcase and cane, who seems in a hurry. Ken goes to work. The stranger (Zebedy Colt) goes to visit his girlfriend. With pantyhose over his face, he busts into her apartment and demands she play doctor with him. He makes her strip off her robe, puts tape over her mouth and hogties her while talking in a childish voice and singing "Ring Around the Rosie." Then he decides to take her temperature but forgot his thermometer. I'm sure you can use your imagination with that one. After he's finished with that, he throws her on the floor, starts speaking in his mother's mannered voice, alternates between whipping her ("Naughty girl!") and whipping himself ("Bad boy!"), smacks her, beats her head off the floor and tells her she deserves it. Finally, he puts her out of her misery by cutting her throat (the blade is located inside his cane).

Forgetting his briefcase, Ken has to return early and when he does he finds Faye dead. Thankfully the killer had dropped a matchbook outside that says "21 Club. 'Artie' After 9!" on it, which at least gives him his first clue. After being questioned by Inspector Allen (an uncredited Robert Kerman), Ken goes to a bar to drown his sorrows. Two girls there offer up their, uh, services, to help him get his mind off things. Afterward one of the girls tells Ken if she were him that she'd go buy a guy and hunt down the fucker who killed his girl... and that's exactly what Ken does. He keeps tabs on what's going on via news broadcasts and learns that Club 21 is a gay bar but there's no one named Artie there. Still not over his girlfriend, he goes to visit Faye's compassionate neighbor Alice ("Sue Franklin" / Nancy Dare), who cooks him dinner and then, uh, comforts him. Hell, his fiance's not even two days dead yet and he's already nailed three chicks. I guess her getting offed might not be such a bad thing after all.

Meanwhile, the psycho does poppers, puts on lipstick and a jock strap and then busts into a black couple's apartment with a gun. He tells them "I want to see your naked bodies playing nice games!" The girl throws her panties at him and yells "Smell it, baby! I know you wish you could have this!" At gunpoint he forces them to have sex while barking out various orders in his childish voice. The girl (who is a great little actress by the way) asks, "Is that what you want to see you dirty mother fucker?" He then forces the guy to flip her over and "bite her little assy." When he refuses to bite off her nipple, he's slashed to death. The killer and the girl get in a struggle on the couch. Her wig falls off and then he slashes her throat and then castrates the dead guy for good measure. Ken then decides to hit the streets to hunt down who the press has dubbed "The Sword Killer." Mid-chase, the psycho yanks a woman off the street (Terri Hall) into an abandoned building. Can Ken get to them before he claims his next victim?

Clearly taking its cue from the hit DEATH WISH (1974) in more than just title, this very unpleasant hard X film has built up a reputation over the years as a sick classic. So does it actually live up to its reputation? For the mosst part, I'd say yes. At least if you're like me and not well versed on this kind of stuff. The attack scenes are very twisted, effective and made even nastier by the inclusion of hardcore sex. Still, they wouldn't have near the impact they do if not for the effectively deranged performance from Zebedy Colt as the psycho. Colt - a New York stage actor and gay cabaret singer who moonlit in straight porn because the parts were better - goes all out in this role: crying, screaming, laughing and even changing up his voice whenever necessary. If this same performance was in an R-rated film, it would probably be lauded. On the down side, all of the actual death scenes are ineptly staged, with the weapon clearly not making contact with the body. Reems' straight sex scenes are a bore, too, but that's why they invented a fast forward button. Still, the film would have obviously been better with more Colt and less Reems.

As you can tell from my screen caps (taken from Alpha Blue Archives' release), I didn't have a decent copy at my disposal and I'm not even sure if one is even available at this point. Yet somehow, how terrible this thing looked was completely fitting. Director "Tim McCoy" (Victor Milt) also made THE EROTIC DR. JEKYLL (1975), which featured much of the same cast seen here, including Reems and Colt.

★★

Die, Monster, Die! (1965)

... aka: Colour Out of Space, The
... aka: Monster, The
... aka: Monster of Terror

Directed by:
Daniel Haller

Though Roger Corman's The Haunted Palace (1963) is still to this day grouped into the director's eight-part Edgar Allan Poe series, it was actually based primarily on H.P. Lovecraft's short story "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward." Despite how it was initially promoted, Palace was in fact the very first feature-length attempt at bringing Lovecraft to the big screen. Die, Monster, Die! (UK title: Monster of Terror) was the second attempt and is based on Lovecraft's wonderful short story "The Colour Out of Space." Screenwriter Jerry Sohl has altered many things from the story and added new ideas and characters, but he at least honors the general premise of the tale here. Director Haller, making his directorial debut, had previously done splendid economy-class art direction on many of the Corman-Poe films (including Palace) and brings that same kind of attention to detail and atmosphere to this one.

Honoring a request for a visit from his girlfriend's mother, American Stephen Reinhart (Nick Adams) arrives via train to the small British village of Arkham. Once there, he's unable to get a taxi ride or even rent a bicycle to transport himself to his destination. Seems the folks round those parts have a problem with the same family Stephen is planning to visit. He's forced to walk a good piece to his destination. Along the way there, Stephen must ignore no trespassing signs everywhere, sidestep strategically placed bear traps and, strangest of all, pass by a huge empty crater and a forest full of charred trees. Upon arriving at the Witley home, Stephen is given a cold, rude reception by wheelchair-bound patriarch Nahum (Boris Karloff), who immediately asks him to leave. His girlfriend Susan (Suzan Farmer) greets him warmly, however, and takes him upstairs to meet her mother Letitia (Freda Jackson). Mum's not doing very well it seems.

Not only is Letitia sickly and bedridden, but she's also strangely light-sensitive and refuses to be seen. She warns Stephen about the family history (Nahum's father apparently dabbled in Satanism) and tells him her maid went crazy and has since vanished. She also begs Stephen to take her daughter out of the home. Because of her mother's illness and her father's erratic behavior, Susan refuses until she finds out just what is going on. At dinner that evening, servant Merwyn (Terence de Marney) - forced to wear dark glasses because he's inflicted with the same malady effecting Letitia - collapses and then later dies. Strange screams are frequently heard throughout the home but seem to have no source and a shrouded figure lurks the grounds brandishing a knife. Stephen goes to a local doctor (Patrick Magee) for help, but he's a drunk who has been driven half mad himself by whatever's going on at the Witley estate and is of no help.

If you're familiar with the story or have seen any of the later film adaptations, such as THE CURSE (1987) or the recent Italian adaptation Colour from the Dark (2008), then you already know that a fallen meteor is responsible for everything odd that's been occurring. Nahum keeps a huge chunk of it down in the cellar and has it spread throughout his greenhouse and who knows where else. Enough exposure to the radioactive alien mineral leads to excessive growth in plants (plus enables them to attack) and madness and mutation in both plants and animals.

Despite the old school Gothic setting (large castle, fog-shrouded forests and graveyards), this seems strangely modern at times in terms of character actions, pacing and sound design. Haller and his crew make it all quite atmospheric, there are some interesting aural and light effects used at the finale, nice use of matte paintings throughout, some mildly icky make-up fx (such as a face melting down) and an interesting metallic-looking meteor monster that shows up at the very end. It runs just 75 minutes.

★★1/2

Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965)

... aka: Blood Suckers, The
... aka: Die Todeskarten des Dr. Schreck
... aka: Le train des épouvantes (Train of Terrors)

Directed by:
"Freddy" (Freddie) Francis

Neither the best nor the worst anthology from either Amicus or director Francis. The film is generally well-made, the cast is good and it's entertaining, but it also suffers from trying to cram too many stories (five of 'em, plus a lengthy framework) into just an hour and a half. This results in three of the five tales being sadly underdeveloped. Late one evening, five different well-groomed men board the same compartment on a train for presumably an all-night trip. Mysterious occult / metaphysics expert Dr. Schreck (Peter Cushing, with fake caterpillar eyebrows and a German accent) becomes the sixth. A few of the men help Scheck pick up his belongings after he drops his bag and notice he's in possession of a deck of tarot cards. Franklyn Marsh (Christopher Lee) labels it "nonsense" and accuses Schreck of being a charlatan, but the other men are interested in having their fortunes told. All they have to do is tap the cards three times, then they're shuffled and dealt. The first four cards foretell destiny and the fifth gives him the knowledge to change it if he so chooses. Well, unless it's already too late.

After selling his ancestral house, located on a foggy island, architect Jim Dawson (Neil McCallum) gets the opportunity to go back to help its new owner - wealthy and attractive widow Deirdre Biddolph (Ursula Howells) - with some alterations. She wants to tear down a wall to create a large room to showcase her deceased archeologist husband's collection of artifacts. Also living there are a groundskeeper Caleb (Peter Madden) and his granddaughter Valda (Katy Wild), who both lurk around acting mighty suspicious. Jim gets to work on the renovation, but discovers a coffin behind a newly built wall in the cellar. The coffin - decorated with an ornate wolf head - supposedly belongs to one Cosmo Waldemar, who was rumored to be a werewolf and has a grudge to pick with the Dawson family for a wrongdoing centuries earlier. Cosmo's body disappears from the coffin, wolf tracks are found on the dirt floor, howling is heard at night and Valda turns up dead after trying to warn Jim of something. He makes silver bullets out of a heirloom cross and waits by the coffin... Cramming all of this into just over 10 minutes turns out to be a mistake, since it's poorly paced and underbaked. The 'werewolf,' by the way, is just a dog.

Upon returning from holiday, Bill (Alan Freeman) and his wife Ann (Ann Bell) notice a strange vine growing alongside their home. The plant seems to cry out in pain when hit with a hoe and even knocks a pair of shears out of Bill's hand when he tries to snip it! The family seeks the aid of a few scientists (including Bernard Lee), who draw the conclusion that this is the new evolution in plant which may take over the planet if not stopped. It's superintelligent (enough so to cut the phone line!), kills the pet dog when it digs at the roots, strangles one of scientists and eventually surrounds the entire home, trapping the family inside. But like most other living beings, it's scared of fire. Potentially interesting segment but again it's too short and could have used some fleshing out. The open ending won't sit well with some viewers.

In our next story, jazz trumpeter and all-around goofball Biff Bailey (Roy Castle) gets a gig at the Flamingo Club on an island in the West Indies. Though he's warned against it, Biff sneaks out at night to attend a voodoo ceremony, where he copies down the catchy music of the "Great God Damballah." Natives warn him not to use, but when he returns to London he does anyway, which leads to wind destroying his club and an evil presence following him home. Much better than the first two segments, this seems paced about right, is amusing, has several great musical numbers and a surprisingly non-horrific or mean-spirited finale. By the way, the misleading title for the film comes from this segment: the lead characters passes by a mock "Dr. Terror's House of Horrors" poster on a wall stating its stars are "Franklyn Marsh," "Sandor Shreck" and "Biff Bailey!"

Back on the train, Dr. Schreck finally convinces Mr. Marsh / Lee to have his fortune told. Marsh is a snooty, uptight art critic who gets his jollies humiliating artists with bad write-ups in the local paper. During a showing of work from painter Eric Landor (Michael Gough), the tables are turned when it's Marsh who gets humiliated by praising a painting done by a chimpanzee. Landor continues to harass Marsh by constantly referencing the incident to destroy his credibility. Fed up, Marsh runs him over with his car, severing his hand in the incident. Unable to paint, Landor gets depressed and commits suicide. But Marsh gets his just desserts in the form of a living, disembodied hand that never seems to go away regardless of what Marsh does to it. This segment is the most memorable of the bunch, has one of the more enjoyable Lee performances and the special effects on the crawling hand are surprisingly effective.

Finally, things wrap up with a rather ordinary vampire tale. Doctor Bob Carroll (Donald Sutherland) has just taken a new bride - the sexy Nicole (Jennifer Jayne). Nicole disappears late at night every night; turning into a bat and going out to do her bloodsucking thing. Meanwhile, a young boy shows up at Bob's clinic with a bad case of anemia and puncture wounds on his neck. Strangely, this segment completely ignores the vampires cannot go out in the daytime mythology but sticks to the rest (turning into bats, being afraid of crucifixes, being killed with a stake through the heart, etc.). There's a cheeky end twist involving Bob's boss, Dr. Blake (Max Adrian), which is the only thing to breath any life into this tired tale. We return to the train for the final twist involving Dr. Schreck and the passengers, which is rather predictable itself.

What would have greatly improved this would have been to cut out one of the lesser segments, preferrable the werewolf one since it's the weakest, least interesting and boasts the lamest twist of the bunch, and then used that saved time to expand upon the other two weaker tales. The "Voodoo" and "Disembodied Hand" stories work just fine as they are, as does the framework itself thanks to the wonderfully sinister Cushing. It's worth watching for these... just expect some lulls along the way.

Francis also made the Amicus anthologies TORTURE GARDEN (1967) and TALES FROM THE CRYPT (1971) as well as the non-Amicus TALES THAT WITNESS MADNESS (1973). The widescreen German DVD from Koch Entertainment is the one I viewed (their title translates to something like "Death Cards of Dr. Schreck"). It was distributed by Anchor Bay in the UK and might finally be getting a DVD release in America later this year through Olive Films (though I wouldn't hold my breath waiting).

★★1/2

Demon Rage (1980)

... aka: Dark Eyes
... aka: Demon Seed
... aka: Fury of the Succubus
... aka: Satan's Mistress

Directed by:
James Polakof

Originally filmed as Satan's Mistress, this was re-titled Fury of the Succubus for its theatrical release, then re-titled Demon Rage for its initial U.S. video release and then renamed a fourth time as Dark Eyes for cable TV broadcasts. As if that didn't cause enough confusion already, the title I got my hands on had the superimposed new title of Demon Seed. To avoid mixing this up with the 1977 evil computer film with that same title, I'm going to go ahead and list this under the Rage moniker since that's probably what this is best known as anyway. By any title, it sucks. They really should have just called it "Excuse To Get Plenty O'Toole Naked" since that's what the true agenda seems to be from the very first scene of Lana Wood running down the beach in slow-motion with her breast popping out of her nightgown. The well-endowed Ms. Wood was, of course, the sister of actress Natalie Wood. And just like in real-life where she was always in the shadow of her much more famous sister, Lana even has to play second banana to someone else in her own starring vehicle. Despite the fact she's the clear lead and this was obvioulsy made to showcase her talent(s), she still gets billed behind Swedish sexpot Britt Ekland, who only plays a supporting role here.

Things open with a nightmare sequence and then title cards letting us know that lonely people may be more in touch with the supernatural than anyone else. Lisa (Wood) is one such lonely person. She's stuck in a bad marriage with successful, busy architect Burt (Tom Hallick), who not only ignores her sexually, but is distant, emotionally abusive ("Bitch!") and may be having an affair behind her back. Lisa, Burt and their teenage daughter Michelle (Sherry Scott) have recently moved into a nice, secluded beach house but it has failed to inject any life into the failed marriage. In fact, since it's haunted by a sex-starved demon it ends up making things much worse. One evening while Lisa and Burt are entertaining another couple; Ann-Marie (Ekland), a psychic, and Carl (Dan Galloway), a classy fellow who refers to the hostess as a "Goddess of sensuality" and says he wants to "ravage" her, a black cat shows up from out of nowhere. When Michelle tries to grab it, it scratches her and runs off. Michelle realizes something bizarre is afoot, picks up a strange aura from the home and has visions of a statue crying blood. Burt also starts picking up signs that the place may be haunted and starts having nightmares of his own.

Though Lisa's husband isn't all that interested in her any more, there's a horny, bearded demon / ghost who is and he (Kabir Bedi) starts paying Lisa nightly visits to ravish her in her sleep. Eventually, Lisa moves into a spare bedroom, keeps the door locked at all times, starts ignoring her family and paints evil faces when she isn't being molested. Her hubby decides that he wants to reconcile and the two start to get back on track, but the demon returns to take possession of her again. Meanwhile, Michelle encounters a mysterious woman named Belline (Elyse-Anne) on the beach who informs her that she shares the name with an angel who left God to be with Lucifer. Michelle then keeps hearing Belline's voice telling her "You WILL help us!" She also has a nightmare which is distorted so badly through a wavy effect that I couldn't tell just what was happening. It appears that a cat is killed and people drown in quicksand on the beach but it was too difficult to make it out.

Blood appears on people's hands but disappears, the black cat keeps showing up (accompanied by a hilarious synthesized hiss) and the water in a hot tub suddenly becomes so hot it starts smoking. After her husband gets decapitated with a guillotine conveniently located in the basement, Ann-Marie urges the family to leave, but they don't. Burt is finally convinced to try to get them out and they get advice from priest and supernatural expert Father Stratten (John Carradine, who has just one scene in this one) beforehand. The ending is a complete anti-climactic mess with the gates of hell having been apparently opened in the basement, demons cackling, someone holding a severed head and everything being enveloped in fire.

Despite the frequency of nudity from Wood and about a hundred picturesque shots of the beach, this is a dreary, poorly made bore. I have to say though, that I think this movie is based on the same "true story" as THE ENTITY (filmed in 1981; released in '83) and beat it to the punch by at least a year (the copyright date for Demon Rage is 1980). The two films have a near identical premise, though The Entity - which isn't very good either - had the luxury of a big budget, an actual marketing campaign and respected actress Barbara Hershey in the lead role. This one's much lower budgeted, the acting is uneven, the photography is too dark and it becomes annoyingly repetitive after a short while.

The director also made the dull getting-back-to-nature pacifist hippie drama SLASHED DREAMS (1974), which was falsely marketed as a horror film because it featured Robert Englund in an early role.

★1/2