Bad Blood (1989)

...aka: Woman Obsessed, A

...aka: Woman's Obsession, A

Directed by:

Chuck Vincent

With efforts such as In Love (1981) and Roommates (1982), New York City-based filmmaker Chuck Vincent managed to pull off the almost-impossible: garnering mainstream critical respect for adult film work. That was something not at all common, and is actually quite impressive when you take into consideration how X-rated films are usually demonized by both critics and society in general. Though I've personally received some nasty / negative feedback for doing so, I've never shied away from including adult films here at The Bloody Pit of Horror as long as they meet the timeline / content criteria. Some of the X-rated horror titles I've seen from the Golden Age of such films are as good as similar films with an R-rating. On a very rare occasion, they're even better. I'm sure Vincent's acclaimed adult titles are about the same. Sure, they include graphic sex, but the acting and screenplays are also apparently quite good and the films stack up favorably against many R-rated comedies or dramas of their time. I wouldn't know for sure since I've not actually seen any of these, but it seems to be the general consensus based on reviews I've read.

Vincent went a more mainstream route throughout the 1980s with only marginal success. He cranked out a slew of silly sex comedies (which were popular on cable and VHS at the time) and a handful of thrillers. Based on the inventive, bizarre, disturbing, Repulsion-inspired DERANGED (1987), which played out like a good stage play, and this one, I'd say it's a true shame Mr. Vincent (who passed away in 1991; another casualty of the AIDS crisis) didn't concentrate more on darker thrillers because he seemed to have a real knack for psychological horror that didn't quite get perfected during his lifetime. Each of his thrillers are uneven, but possess elements of excellence and showcase much promise.

Bad Blood (which played on TV under that title but was distributed on VHS as A Woman Obsessed) also proves to be a great showcase for the talents of Georgina Spelvin (billed as "Ruth Raymond" here). Spelvin, of course, was one of the top adult stars of the 1970s, beginning with the groundbreaking classic The Devil in Miss Jones in 1973. Already a mature actress in her 40s at the start of her porn career, Spelvin was even more seasoned by the late 80s when Bad Blood was made. In a way, this film is to Spelvin what What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? was to Bette Davis, or Strait-Jacket was to Joan Crawford: a platform for an experience actress deemed "past her prime" or "over the hill" to show the world she's still more than a little capable of carrying a film all on her own. The film also marked the "legit" debut for popular porn actor Randy Spears (billed as "Gregory Patrick"), who is adequate - though not exceptional - as the male lead. Linda Blair and Troy Donahue round out the cast and brought along with them the direct-to-video star power to ensure this had a healthy run on cable during its day.

Successful New York City lawyer Ted Barnes (Spears) is out taking a jog when he's pulled into an art gallery by the owner (Frank Stewart), who shows him a portrait of a man who bears an uncanny resemblance to himself. The kicker? The portrait was painted 25 years earlier. Ted and his real estate agent wife Evie (Blair) decide to go to the showing and are introduced to the woman who painted it. She - Arlene Bellings (Spelvin) - tells him the painting is of her late husband. She also informs Ted that he's actually her son. Ted, having no clue he'd even been adopted, confronts Wanda (Carolyn Van Bellinghen), the woman he's believed to be his birth mother all these years. Wanda finally tells him the truth. Unable to conceive, her husband Jack (Donahue) was threatening to leave her, so she arranged to purchase a baby on the black market and try to pass it off as her own. The baby? Ted, of course. Arlene fills in the rest of the blanks on the sad tale. Her former husband Joe had kidnapped infant Ted and tried to blackmail Arlene and her wealthy father. One thing led to another and Arlene's father shot Joe dead before finding out the whereabouts of the baby. Baby Ted was stashed in a hotel and, feeling he'd been abandoned anyway, Wanda took him and passed him off as her own.

Wanting to finally start a relationship, Arlene (who'd inherited a great deal of money from her now-deceased pops), invites Ted and Evie out for the weekend to her sprawling Long Island mansion. She shows her son off at a lavish party and makes sure Evie gets plenty of tasty hors d'vores while there. Ted is clued in that something might not be quite right by a war vet friend of his birth father's and from a chatterbox bimbo maid named Crystal (Christina Veronica). Later that night, Ted catches Arlene wandering around outside. He follows her to the family graveyard, where she goes on a scary tirade by her late father's grave, informing him that "Joe has come back!" Yes, Arlene has a bad habit of calling Ted "Joe." That's because she's so crazy she thinks her newfound son IS her long-dead husband, the only man she ever loved and brought her true happiness. And Arlene will do anything not to let him slip away again.

First up, she needs to get rid of his pesky wife. Arlene's been poisoning everything she's given Evie to eat or drink. She's so nauseated, weakened and cramped up she can barely get out of bed the next day, so Ted has to be Arlene's date to a charity function. When Ted and Evie do finally try to leave, they run over something that turns out to be Crystal's corpse. A sheriff stops by and suggests they stay in the area in case he has any follow-up questions, so back to Arlene's they go. And that's when Arlene decides to really let it all hang out. While Evie is upstairs unknowingly eating more tainted food, Arlene is downstairs decked out in a poofy-shouldered ball gown preparing a candlelight dinner, pouring the champagne and putting on romantic music for her and her son. By this point she doesn't even bother calling Ted by his real name any longer. He's Joe to her and that's that. Evie manages to wander downstairs and when she gets there she finds Arlene laying on top of Ted kissing him. In a highly effective slow-motion sequence that lasts several minutes, Arlene slashes poor Evie up with a knife and then cuts her throat.

In scenes very reminiscent of the following year's MISERY (only much, much sicker!), Ted awakens tied to a bed in the attic and at the whim of his deranged mama, who is prone to fits of sudden rage. When Ted gets defiant with his captor, he's slapped around, kicked and refused food and water. Arlene punishes him for using foul language and for wetting the bed and, when he tries to get the attention of a cop by making noise, Arlene plays a deranged version of This Little Piggy, breaking all of his toes in the process! She wants her son to have "desire for" her and, during the film's most twisted moment, she barges into his room drunk, strips off his underwear and rapes him while he cries! The ending goes way over-the-top as Arlene invites a bunch of her friends and Ted's adoptive parents over for a wedding ceremony that includes her walking Ted around on a leash, running around with a straight razor trying to slash people up, attempting to drown Wanda in a bathtub, throwing Jack over a banister and getting into a prolonged cat fight with the other mother, capped off with a rip-off of the final moment from Carrie (1976).

It's well-made, extremely twisted, stylishly shot and edited (with good use made of slow-motion and even split screen), entertaining... and really deserves to be released on DVD. Unfortunately, it - along with most of Vincent's other mainstream efforts, including the aforementioned Deranged starring Veronica Hart (who has a small role here as well) - has all but vanished since its initial VHS release. Most of the actors are able to skillfully navigate their way through some very long takes here. Spelvin in particular is great and goes all out in her role, which is played with more than just a hint of scenery-chewing camp. She even gets to destroy an entire room full of furniture with a baseball bat while screaming at the top of her lungs!

The video was distributed by Academy in 1989 (the film carries a 1988 copyright date). King's novel Misery was published in 1987 and perhaps influenced Craig Horrall's screenplay.

★★★

La revanche des mortes vivantes (1987)

... aka: Living Dead, The
... aka: Revenge of the Living Dead Girls

Directed by:

Pierre B. Reinhard

A female hitchhiker distracts a truck driver long enough for a biker to slip some kind of toxic orange chemical into the milk supply he’s hauling. Three young women living in the same French town, Catherine, Jocelyn and Florence, end up drinking the milk, immediately drop dead and are entombed. Meanwhile, at O.K.F. Chemical, branch director Jack Alphen is being investigated in both the deaths and other unethical practices and has to attend a conference in Germany to try to smooth things over with his superiors. His evil bitch secretary Bridget hatches a scheme to blackmail the company for three million dollars by taping Alphen with a prostitute and threatening to expose his other criminal activities, which include illegal chemical dumping. Niemann, the dolt hired to dispose of the chemicals, decides to do so at the local cemetery; resurrecting the three poisoned girls as vengeful rotten-faced zombies who go on a murderous rampage. They seem to be targeting people involved with O.K.F., including Alphen, his unfaithful wife Valerie, the truck driver and a chemist named Christian who’s cheating on his pregnant wife with Alphen's wife. Christian becomes infected himself when he accidentally screws (!) one of the Living Dead Girls.

Plenty of factors go into making Living Dead Girls a fine guilty pleasure. It’s a nice-looking film, the soundtrack (including a recurring catchy pop tune) is great, it’s loaded with blood and nudity, the zombie masks are pretty cool and the dialogue is often hilarious. It’s filled with sleazy characters doing sleazy things and the very tasteless gore scenes are perfectly in tune with the other seedy goings on. A woman has her eyeball poked out with a high heeled shoe, a man has his penis bitten off and is disemboweled, a woman is raped with a sword and there’s a messy miscarriage in the shower. The film doesn’t so much as qualify for “SBIG” status because it seems well aware that it’s nothing more than trash. The people who did the English dubbing seem aware of that fact also. The run time is only 74 minutes and the DVD comes with an alternate ending that wasn’t used (when you see it you’ll understand why!).

Director Reinhard (who uses the alias “Peter B. Harsone” here) is better known for his adult film work and most of the ladies seen here also appeared in his other films.

★★1/2

Desnuda inquietud (1976)

...aka: Rape

Directed by:

Miguel Iglesias

Misleadingly packaged and re-titled for the Mogul video release here in America, this slow, atrociously-dubbed Spanish supernatural tale is a bad combination of dull and muddled. In Paris, an otherwise wealthy man named Jean Dupre passes away under mysterious circumstances. No one, not even a doctor, can figure out why he died, but ghostly shadows showing up in some photographs prompt a couple of his friends to do their own investigating. Roger ("Rick Joss"/ Ramiro Oliveros), a psychiatrist, and Frank (Gil Vidal), a reporter and photographer, decide to head to the same Spanish village Jean visited right before he passed away. There, they encounter superstitious townspeople who don't seem to want to discuss their friend. They also learn that Jean had been running around with a beautiful young woman named Maria (Nadiuska) who was rumored to be a witch who casts an "evil eye" over men. Maria and her father Gabriel (Luis Induni) were driven out of town.

Through hints given to them by bartender Marcelino (Alfred Lucchetti) and Dr. Morin, the men are finally able to locate Maria and Gabriel living high up in the mountains in a cabin. From there on a strange and very confused tale of possession unfolds. Maria's subconscious seems to strike out at any man who gets sexually aggressive with her, leading to madness and death. Maria also has telekinetic abilities and is able to heal the sick with just a touch. When a photo is taken of her former home, ancient Aztec symbols that aren't really there show up on the walls. When a second photo is taken of a nude Maria bathing in a stream, they come back distorted.

Thankfully, Roger knows all about paranormal phenomenon and hypnosis so he's able to put the pouty beauty under and reveal that in a past life she was actually "The Princess of Moctezuma." We even get some incredibly clumsy and unconvincing Aztec flashbacks where the Princess' village is attacked, she's captured by the enemy and ends up falling in love with a white soldier. Strangely, none of that sheds light on what's going on in the present day. I wasn't sure if Maria was possessed, reincarnated, cursed or just able to act out on her subconscious because of her Aztec blood line, though no information is given about Aztec customs or rites to help us get a handle on it. For some reason Maria has an irrational fear of fire, yet the flashbacks don't give any reason for it. I also didn't really understand why a nice Princess would want to kill horny, pushy guys, but whatever. The mumbo jumbo is layed on way too thick and heavy here.

The original Spanish title translates to something like "Naked Concern," but here in the states they just lay it all out there and call it RAPE. Can't say that I blame them. If they couldn't play up on the one stray tasteless moment in the film (where Gabriel tries to molest his supposed "daughter") this would have otherwise been a hard sell. Nadiuska (a German-born model and actress very popular in Europe at the time) provides some T&A, but based on some screen caps I've seen from the uncut version, the full frontals have all been removed. Violence? What violence?! Not that I necessarily need every film to be a bloodbath, but it certainly would have helped perk this murky bore up a little bit.

Gaspar 'Indio' Gonzales and Fernando Ulloa both have small roles here. Director Iglesias (who used the name "M.I. Bonns" here) had previously made the werewolf vs. yeti Paul Naschy vehicle NIGHT OF THE HOWLING BEAST (1975).

★1/2

Rimba Panas (1988)

...aka: Jungle Heat

Directed by:
Ratno Timoer

Not to be confused with at least three other films with the same name from the 80s; the 1983 one involving a tribe of reptile-men and originally filmed as DANCE OF THE DWARFS, the 1985 Hong Kong production about POW prison camp atrocities or the barely-seen 1988 Cynthia Rothrock vehicle. This one's a Filipino/Indonesian co-production that falls into both the cannibal-shocker horror and lighter jungle adventure subgenres. As of this writing, it's not listed on IMDb and has never been released in America, though an English-dubbed copy surfaced on video in Greece which seems to be the source print for the bootlegs out there for sale. Despite being sourced from VHS, the print quality isn't too bad and the film (regardless of some horrendous and highly annoying dubbed dialogue) is fairly well made, kind of fun and surprisingly gory at times.

A couple of guys in the jungle fight over some precious stones and end up shooting and killing each other. Back at their base camp, a native tribe attacks and kill everyone there with spears and arrows and take a baby girl named Jessica back to their village. Many years later, a tough cookie named Lola (Alba Fuad) gets her hands on a diary and map detailing where a valuable treasure is hidden. While she gets together a team of people for a jungle expedition to be headed by Peter (Peter O'Brian) and his buddy John (Johan Saimima), some thugs overhear her talking about it, kidnap her and take her deep into the jungle. Once there, Lola manages to escape, while a cannibal tribe get their hands on her abductors. One guy is cut up and fed to a tiger. Another is decapitated and eaten raw. The ringleader - Nick (Didier Hamel) - manages to save himself by demonstrating a gun to them.

Meanwhile, Lola lucks out that Peter and John have both come to the area looking for her. The two men locate her and they resume their treasure hunting as planned, but wreck their canoe over some rapids and end up in the hands of a tribe. Lucky for them they don't end up with the cannibal tribe, but instead with a mostly peaceful tribe that includes a now-grown, blonde and statuesque Jessica (Debbie Young), who spends much of her time running through misty fields in a thong and taking slow-motion swims while pan flute music plays. Peter takes an instant liking to Jessica (now named "Mazizi"), but a tribal warrior (who already has four other wives) also wants her, so the guys must fight mano y mano for the honor of the jungle babe. Eventually, a bunch of jewels are located in a cave and brutish Nick shows up with the rival cannibal tribe to fight for them.

Similar in some ways to Jess Franco's dreadful WHITE CANNIBAL QUEEN (1980), but a bit more fun and enjoyable than that one. (How could it not be?) The presentation of the natives and their village are more convincing (no pudgy caucasians in sight!), the locations are better and there's bloody, brainless action going on much of the time to distract you from how stupid the whole thing is. I knew nothing about New Zealand-born lead actor O'Brian going into this one but apparently he has a small cult following for playing "Rambu" in the 1986 Indonesian action flick THE INTRUDER. The man playing Albert (Jessica's father) in the opening sequence is none other than Charles Kaufman, the brother of Troma founder Lloyd Kaufman and director of the semi-famous bad taste shocker MOTHER'S DAY (1980). He was over in Indonesia making JAKARTA (1988) when he took this small supporting role. Advent Bangun (a star of THE DEVIL'S SWORD, from the same director) and Piet Burnama (JUNGLE VIRGIN FORCE) co-star. PETA warning: Some real animals (namely boars) are actually killed in the film.

★★

Caligola: La storia mai raccontata (1981)

...aka: Caligula: The Untold Story
...aka: Caligula II
...aka: Caligula 2: The Untold Story

...aka: Emperor Caligula
...aka: Emperor Caligula: The Untold Story
...aka: Garden of Taboo, The

Directed by:
Joe D'Amato

The violent, sexually graphic and big budgeted historical epic CALIGULA (which was produced by Bob Guccione of Penthouse Magazine fame) was neither a critical success nor a box office hit upon release, but it made so many international headlines throughout production that the low-budget, mostly European copies began right away. Many of these actually managed to beat their controversial cousin (which began filming in 1976, but didn't get released until three years later) to theater screens. This one, from well-known Italian sleaze director D'Amato (using the alias "David Hills" here) isn't one of the earlier ones but is likely the closest actual copy out there. Like the Guccione film, it's tasteless, overlong, gory, loaded with sex (some soft, some hard) and sexual perversity and was released in many altered versions for different international markets, including an R-rated cut missing over 20 minutes that was first unleashed to video here in America. Unlike the Guccione film, it's low-budget; completely lacking the grandiose sets, elaborate costumes and a "respectable" star-studded cast, yet it still manages that cheaply efficient shock the director is best known for.

David Brandon (as "David Cain") has the title role, as the insane, sadistic and sanctimonious Roman emperor who spends his time cooking up ways to humiliate and mutilate innocent people. After foiling would-be assassin Domitius (Michele Soavi), having him crippled and his tongue cut out, he and his lover Messala ("Oliver Finch"/ Luciano Bartoli) rape and kill virginal Livia (Fabiola Toledo). Though they blame the murder on others, Livia's confidant Miriam (Laura Gemser) knows what really happened and vows revenge. She has her opportunity when Caligula puts together a brothel full of beautiful women (mostly religious women dragged in against their will) to service wealthy senators he wants to help finance a pet project. Miriam, no stranger to sapphic love but still technically a virgin, deflowers herself with a dildo before God to prepare herself for the things she'll have to do in order to get closer to the emperor. But right as she's in a good position to strike out, she ends up falling for him.

What you'll see here, technically speaking, is generally unimpressive. The director also shot the film; opting for darkly lit interiors and soft-focus exteriors. Carlo Maria Cordio does provide an eerie score and there are appropriate costumes, but ancient Rome isn't meticulously brought to life via architecture and art direction. In fact, much of the action is filmed outdoors (in the woods, a beach, a cave...) to deliberately avoid all that. Though there's plenty of full nudity and soft-core sex, the hardcore is relegated to just two scenes; where the ladies have to practice their craft on a Greek soldier and during the brothel scene that follows, all of which use extras (likely Euro porn stars). Said brothel scene goes one step further than CALIGULA ever did, though, by having a graphic scene featuring a lady and a horse. We also get Caligula killing a newborn infant by flinging it against a wall and a memorably disgusting bit where men are killed by having metal poles shoved up their asses.

The cast includes Charles Borromel (MONSTER HUNTER), Gabriele Tinti (Gemser's husband) and Mark Shannon (EROTIC NIGHTS OF THE LIVING DEAD). The director, who also co-scripted with "Larry Franks" (George Eastman), was a big presence in 70s and 80s Euro exploitation world until he switched his attention to hardcore in the 90s. In that arena, he revisited the Roman themes again with CALIGULA: THE DEVIANT EMPEROR (1997) and other titles. The full uncut version of the film runs 125 minutes, though the UK release is just 86 and the R-rated U.S. version is 92.

★★

Night Screams (1987)

Directed by:

Allen Plone

A late offering in the first American slasher cycle, this production from Wichita, Kansas is extremely dumb but decently-shot, packed with tacky 80s entertainment value and has that low-budget regional charm I just so happen to love (see OFFERINGS for more of the same). A pair of sadistic criminals kill two cops, shoot up a diner, escape into the woods and end up finding a large country home to hide out in. Meanwhile, musclebound football hero David (Joe Manno) has just won another game for his team and received word that he's snagged a full-paid college scholarship. The bad part is that it's a free ride to a college he doesn't want to attend and his wealthy parents just don't understand. The good news - well, good if you like chubby, shallow chicks with butch perms - is that all the popular cheerleaders now want in his pants. David already has a girlfriend, though; quiet redhead Joni (Megan Wyss), who's new to town and doesn't fit in with the popular people. David decides to throw a party anyway since his parents will be gone for the weekend. His folks remind him to take his medication before they leave because if he doesn't have it he'll become "violent." Perhaps he should just lay off the steroids instead?

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So David, Joni, David's best pal D.B. (Ron Thomas), his girl Lisa (Janette Allyson Caldwell), three other couples and comic relief fat guy Russell (Randy Lundsford) - who doesn't have a girlfriend cause, you know, he's fat - all congregate at David's home to party the night away. It's naturally the same home where the escaped cons from the opening sequence ended up. As they hide out in the wine cellar, the teens branch off to do their thing. Their "thing" usually involves two of them wandering off somewhere to have sex (bedroom, hot tub, sauna), one of them leaving to do something really quickly, their significant other getting killed while they're gone and then them returning to get killed themselves. The chief suspects are obviously the murderous criminals in the basement, but then again, we have David acting a little odd because he didn't get his prescription filled and Joni acting a little odd when someone cracks a shock therapy joke, so you never know.

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At the very least, the filmmakers attempt to make each murder scene a little different, so this has variety going for it. We get a face burned on an indoor grill, an axe to the head, poison gas let loose in a sauna, an electrocution in the hot tub, a strangling, shootings, a fire poker impalement and more. The film also delivers on the nudity, though it does so in the cheapest, strangest way possible. Apparently none of the ladies on hand wanted to do it, so they just swapped it all from other films and show it playing on TV sets throughout the film. The first source is from the 1981 slasher GRADUATION DAY, where we get to see a girl-changing-clothes and fencing-sword-through-the-throat murder, as well as Linnea Quigley running around topless and getting killed. The second source is from some porno film starring Seka, John Holmes and Honey Wilder, which one of the characters is watching. Both sources are sometime full screen and cut into the movie at odd times. Horror vet Herbert L. Strock (I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF, THE CRAWLING HAND) was the editor!

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My absolute favorite part is a lengthy sequence featuring "the nationally-famous" Sweetheart Dancers; a bunch of frizzy haired chicks in sequin tops who do a horrible choreographed dance while some hair band plays in the background. Yes, I live for such crap.

★★

Lumaban ka, Satanas (1983)

...aka: Furia de satan, Le

...aka: Killing of Satan, The

Directed by:

Efren C. Piñon

Orlando San Miguel (Ramon Revilla), or just Lando to his homies, is your average mustachioed, middle-aged ex-con whose associations with the criminal underworld are about to bite him in the ass. A few armed thugs show up at his doorstep and during a gunfight, both Lando and his young son are shot dead. Strangely, Lando's bullet wound heals itself and he's resurrected without a stratch. It has something to do with his Uncle Miguel, a powerful, God-fearing sorcerer who lives on an island far, far away and sacrificed himself so that Lando can redeem himself. Lando, along with his wife Laura (Elizabeth Oropesa) and teen daughter Betty are taking a boat ride when a force draws them directly to the island. Once they arrive, they learn there's a struggle between the good, peaceful villagers and a rival island of cave-dwelling bad guys led by the red-caped "Prince of Magic." Lando's dormant telepathic powers are awaken during a watery encounter with his Uncle's corpse and he must now use them when his niece Luisa (Cecille Castillo) and his daughter are kidnapped.

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Along with a cousin named Ben, Lando travels to the evil island for a series of weird adventures that involve everything from jumping cobras to evil dwarves to seductive female shapeshifters who can transform into various animals to and other strange otherworldly creatures. Sometimes telepathy is employed in the fights (employing cheap-looking sonar fx) and sometimes it's just your standard hand-to-hand combat. The whole thing follows a simplistic good vs. evil/God vs. Satan template. Yes, all of the baddies are all in cohorts with Satan, but now that Lando is on the right path he discovers that God on his side. In fact, he literally does have God on his side and gets to consult with him before taking on the Prince of the Darkness himself! Satan (Charlie Davao) first appears as a red-painted guy in a red spandex outfit with a mustache, a trident and forked tail before changing into a horned guy in a black suit. And for some reason he wants Lando's whiny daughter to be his bride.

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This simple-headed morality fable might have been a decent little juvenile adventure for kids if not for some nudity (Lando's daughter is thrown into an electric cage full of nude women), some gore (including a guy getting a huge chunk torn out of his face and another smashed with a boulder) and some animal cruelty (real snakes are smashed, burned and thrown around). As for most adults, well you just need to be that special kind of viewer who likes to sit back and laugh at cut-rate production values, awful dialogue, lame special effects and bad acting. If that's what you like, you'll probably love what this one delivers.

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There were many horror films being produced in the Philippines during the 60s, 70s and 80s, but almost none of them (aside from the ones that were financed by other countries and filmed there specifically because it's cheap) received a release outside of Asia. This is one of the few that was. An English-dubbed version was released through Paragon Video Productions.

★★