Tiyanak (1988)

... aka: Goblin
... aka: Monster Baby

Directed by:
Peque Gallaga
Lorenzo A. 'Lore' Reyes

While passing through the jungle, Jopet (Crispin 'Pen' Medina) and his pregnant wife Nelia (Betty Mae Piccio) hear the sound of a baby crying. She goes to investigate, finds an adorable little baby wrapped up in leaves and picks it up, only for the infant to spring to life and go all It's Alive on her. Near where the woman was killed live the well-to-do Marsos family. Virginal daughter Christie (Lotlot De Leon), who's been away at college, decides to come back home for a visit so she can introduce everyone to her medical student boyfriend Jojo (Ramon Christopher). Upon arrival, Christie is disheartened to find that her sister Julie (Janice de Belen) is severely depressed after having had several miscarriages, including a traumatic recent one during the final trimester. Julie's been so shaken up by what she's been through recently, plus the financial burden medicine and frequent doctor's visits are putting on her and her husband Mars (Rudolf Yaptinchay), that she has a screaming nervous breakdown by simply recounting it. Being the good sister she is, Christie is forced to slap the shit out of her to calm her down and then tells her to “Trust in God.” Well, God's line's apparently busy, so someone else ends up answering her call.

After hearing several neighborhood boys talking about monsters said to be lurking in the woods, little sister Monica (Carmina Villaroel) consults her husky-voiced, deeply religious grandmother (Mary Walter, from KILL BARBARA WITH PANIC), who lays out the mythology of the creatures for us. Back when God and Satan were warring for power, three different groups formed: Those who followed God and became angels and saints, those who rebelled and followed Satan and became demons and those who were “two-faced” and refused to take a side. Those in the latter category waited out the revolution until Satan and followers were banished to hell but, by then, it was too late. Their doubt in either side trapped them on Earth, where they are cursed to live as immortal creatures. These beings took the shape of “manananggal” (a bloodsucking, winged witch), “aswang” (a shapeshifter that takes many forms, including that of a werewolf) and “tiyanak” (a vampire-like monster that imitates a child or baby in order to ensnare prey). Because these creatures are doomed to live on Earth forever, they're filled with bitterness and envy and often like to take it all out on any humans they come across.

While outside getting romantic with some guava, Christie and Jojo hear a baby crying and find an abandoned infant in the shed. They bring it back home, where Julie stakes her claim and believes it to be a blessing from God to repay her for all of the babies she's lost. Granny, on the other hand, isn't having any of it (“Maligno! That baby is a devil. Kill it!”) Despite being older and wiser, her warnings are ignored when the man of the house caves in to his wife and allows her to keep it. They name the baby “Angelica” and problems start up right away, with it constantly fussing, cutting Monica's face (which causes a very nasty infection) and tossing an angel figurine onto the floor. After it attacks Monica, Granny attempts to kill it by smothering it and pushing its stroller down the stairs but the baby retaliates and kills her instead.

For some reason, most in the family refuse to believe the baby could be at fault. Christie is skeptical at first and, after the baby disappears, Mars and Julie think it's some kind of extortion / kidnapping scheme orchestrated by a gang of thugs who are actually Jopet and his buddies looking to get revenge on the monster. Having already been attacked once, Monica certainly knows better and teams up with two neighborhood kids: servant boy Niniko (Smokey Manaloto), who witnessed the first killing, and cop's son Aries (Chuckie Dreyfuss), who has access to guns. The three go to visit kindly backwoods medicine woman Telang Bayawak (Zorayda Sanchez), who reveals that the tiyanak hides when it's injured, can only be killed with fire and that, each time it transforms from human baby to monster, it leaves behind a layer of cloth-like skin, sort of like when a snake sheds. She instructs them to get the skin and bring it to her.

Christie finally becomes a believer herself when she rescues the baby from the thugs only to almost get killed herself after it slaughters a female doctor (Suzanne Gonzales) and a nurse at the hospital. Of course, the staff doesn't believe her story and dope her up, so baby Angelica returns home. The following day, the rest of the family go to church to get the baby baptized but it screams, cries, makes candles melt and turns holy water into blood. Jopet and his goons show up with guns; prompting Julie to run off with the baby. She ducks into a movie theater showing HOUSE (1986), falls asleep and little Angelica transforms into a monster and slaughters an annoying kid who won't stop disrupting the movie for the rest of the audience. (Hell, where was Angelica two weeks ago when I went to see The Witch in a cinema packed with teens?) The gang busts in, starts shooting innocent people and Jopet finally pops a cap in the baby's head before going crazy and being hauled off by police while the theater owner chews Julie out for not paying for a ticket and screams things like “I won't watch horror films anymore!” Hilarious! Things finally end up at the house, which the monster has been using as its safe haven all this time, for a fiery finish.

The directors have clearly seen the aforementioned IT'S ALIVE (1974) because this has many scenes clearly inspired by both it and its sequels. It's hampered a bit by poor editing choices that repeatedly cut away from the action and horror scenes to show other characters discussing matters somewhere else. However, none of that means this isn't a hell of a lot of fun! Despite a run time that exceeds 2 hours, things move along quite nicely and it's filled with fun moments, decent horror scenes (especially when the baby traps the leading lady in a storage closet) and even some fully intentional laughs. It's nicely shot, the cable-controlled demon baby design is surprisingly good and the cast is decent as well. Though Julie is annoying and JoJo is a douche bag, this makes up for it with a likable female lead, great supporting roles for Walter (who had been starring in similar films since 1927!!) and Sanchez, plus kid characters who are not only not annoying but actually smarter and more resilient than most of the adults. I'm now officially stoked to see more 80s Filipino horror if they're as much fun as this one.

Co-director Gallaga previously made the “Manananggal” segment in the anthology Shake, Rattle & Roll (1984) and went on to do the “Aswang” segment in Shake, Rattle & Roll II, which he co-directed with Reyes. The two directors also teamed up on a feature-length Aswang movie in 1992, a 1999 follow-up titled Sa piling ng aswang (“In the Presence of the Aswang”) and a 2014 remake of this one titled T'yanak. The 2011 documentary The Aswang Phenomenon features an interview with Gallaga about the vampire-creature legends; which are presented as fact to just about every young child in the Philippines.

★★★

Mirror Mirror (1990)

... aka: Cauchemar Miroir (Nightmare Mirror)
... aka: Reflexo do Demônio (The Demon's Reflection)

Directed by:
Marina Sargenti

Deciding to get away from Los Angeles and start a new life after he husband passes on (and because her shrink recommends it), widow Susan Gordon (Karen Black) purchases a new home in a small Midwestern town that she and her troubled teenage daughter Megan (Rainbow Harvest) promptly move into, little realizing that a murder has already taken place there. Unlike Susan, who's kooky and aloof in that very distinctive Karen Black kinda way, puts up a bubbly appearance for the world at large and dresses in bright flowery dresses and a variety of big hats and “glamorous” wigs, Megan is sullen, pale, standoffish, can't get enough black in her wardrobe and overdoes it with the dark eye shadow and lipstick. Yes, she's Goth with a capital G and, while that may fly in the big city, it makes her an easy target for ridicule in her new small town; most especially at her high school. I'm not sure what middle schools and high schools are like nowadays for kids. Hopefully some of the newer anti-bullying policies and more awareness on the subject have helped matters somewhat but if you were a teen in the 80s or 90s, especially one living in a small town, all that acting or dressing “different” got you was a target on your back.

Immediately after Megan walks into her homeroom on her very first day, the snickering and finger pointing begins. Naturally, the most popular of the bunch, well-endowed rich girl Charlene Kane (Charlie [Spradling]), turns out to be the meanest, but none of them are anywhere near as sadistic and vicious as teens seen in other outcast-strikes-back flicks like CARRIE (1976), JENNIFER (1978), Terror Train (1980), EVILSPEAK (1981) or SLAUGHTER HIGH (1986). In those movies, the cool kids were doing things like dumping pig's blood on heads, tricking nerds into beds with naked corpses, taking incriminating nude photos and trying to get their unpopular targets raped, kidnapped or even killed. You know, things cruel enough to conceivably make one snap. In this one, they laugh, whisper and say the occasional rude, bitchy thing but keep their hands to themselves. Megan is lucky enough to find an ally in Nikki (Kristin Dattilo) right away, who befriends her on her first day of school, helps protect her and even gets her boyfriend Ron (Ricky Paull Goldin) to at least tolerate her. Not only that, but Charlene's good-looking jock boyfriend Jeff (Tom Bresnahan) finds himself attracted to her. In other words, she's hardly in a Carrie White type of situation. Still, some of her peers are decidedly not nice and manage to get on Megan's bad side. Luckily for her, a helpful little gift was left behind from the previous tenants (one rumored to be a witch): an antique mirror that has the ability to grant wishes. Only these wishes come with a nasty kick since the mirror is actually a portal to “the other side” where demons dwell.

Megan first learns of the mirror's power when she wishes her deceased father was still around. He shows up later that night in her bedroom, only in corpse form, and she quickly wishes him away. Because she asked it for something, the mirror then begins working its magic and takes it upon itself to start acting out Megan's innermost desires (whether she really wants it or not); eventually taking possession of her. The mirror bleeds and fester with flies, gives Charlene a nasty nose bleed and makes a science teach (Stephen Tobolowsky) have an asthma attack so bad he has to be hauled off on a stretcher. And then people start dying. All the while, Megan builds up enough self-confidence to be a bit more assertive and starts dressing sexier. Elsewhere, antique dealer Emelin (Yvonne De Carlo), who's in charge of sorting through the belongings from the old house, stumbles upon a diary from the previous tenant which talks about the mirror and its powers. She then studies up on her demonology and comes to the conclusion that she has to try to find a way to get it back again, even if that means breaking into the house and stealing it.

There's a decent amount of blood and gore to help offset just how derivative the whole thing is, including a stabbing, death by flying shards of glass, clawed demon hands emerging from the mirror to make someone's head a bloody mess, a lip getting bitten off and maggots festering in a chicken wing to ruin pet cemetery owner William Sanderson's din-din. The two most memorable bits are Black painting the kitchen red when her hand gets stuck in a garbage disposal and the voluptuous Spradling providing some nice nudity before getting hot steamed in the locker room shower. There's the occasional bit of strange humor (some of which is actually amusing) and clever POV shots from inside the mirror looking out, which utilize a blue hue and distorted sound. This also boasts above average performances from most of the cast. Black is her usual scene-stealing self as the quirky yet self-absorbed mom, De Carlo contributes a nice character bit and nearly all of the younger actors are good, most especially the extremely likable Dattilo as the fun, non-judgmental nice girl that pretty much anyone would want as a friend. Well except for Megan, who can't seem to appreciate much of anything. Speaking of Megan, I do have one major complaint about this one and that's with the casting and scripting of this all-important central role...

While Harvest isn't completely terrible in the part, what she does here could best be described as flat and uninspired. Though the script doesn't do her any favors, her character is almost completely devoid of personality. She's neither interesting nor sympathetic. She's just kind of there looking a bit bored. One gets the feeling that the petite, wide-eyed actress was cast simply because she resembles Winona Ryder, who just played a Goth teen in the horror-comedy hit Beetlejuice (1988). The hair and wardrobe people even style her exactly like Lydia Deetz. The difference? Well, Lydia is good-hearted, drolly funny, clever and likable behind her morbid facade while Megan is pretty much the polar opposite of all that. It's also difficult to get behind the character's “revenge” when she's befriended by a very cool chick her first day of school, gets the attention of the hottest guy there and has a mother who's actually interested in improving their relationship, not to mention the fact that the worst thing the bullies can come up with to do to her is organize a “Dress Like Megan” day and come to school all Gothed out. Lydia would have found that amusing.

The original VHS release from Academy came with a holographic cover featuring the mirror demon reaching its hands out with a tilt of the box.

Filmed in the summer of 1989, this received a limited theatrical release in 1990 from New City Releasing before being ushered out onto home video in 1991. Director Sargenti, formerly a music producer and a director of music videos and commercials, went on to make the TV movie Child of Darkness, Child of Light (1991), which also featured Dattilo. Producer Jimmy Lifton composed the score and went on to direct, produce, write and score the first of three sequels: Mirror Mirror 2: Raven Dance (1993). He also produced Mirror Mirror III: The Voyeur (1995), co-directed by Virginia Perfili (who appears here as a teacher) and Rachel Gordon and Mirror Mirror IV: Reflection (2000), directed by his wife, Paulette Victor. All four titles were bundled together for a DVD release through Starz / Anchor Bay.

★★