Celluloid Bloodbath: More Prevues from Hell (2012)

Directed by:
Jim Monaco
James F. Murray Jr.

The compilation tape MAD RON'S PREVUES FROM HELL - which broke up its exploitation and horror trailers (nearly all from the 60s and 70s) with dumb comic segments featuring ventriloquist Nick Pawlow and his zombie dummy Happy Goldsplatt - debuted on VHS in 1987. Since those were the pre-internet days and the only way to really view such trailers were on similar videos, the comp served a useful purpose in whetting the appetite of potential VHS renters / buyers and showing everyone just what was out there that they otherwise may not be aware of. But really, let's be honest here: These releases were primarily just a cheap and easy way to make money by adding minimal new footage to a bunch of preexisting footage and packaging it all as a "new" release. The first 'greatest hits' film of this type that I'm aware of is Richard Schickel's The Horror Show (1979), a theatrical release from MCA/Universal made right before the big home video boom of the 1980s. It was hosted by Anthony Perkins, featured clips from numerous classic horror films and promised audiences "60 magical years of movie monsters, madmen and other creatures of the night." Strangely, this feature has yet to make it out onto home video itself, but there were many others willing to essentially copy the same exact formula.

The Horror Show (1979) = The original horror compilation movie?

Charles Band's Wizard Video were the pioneers of these early home video releases. Their first was The Best of Sex and Violence (1981) hosted by John Carradine and with special appearances by sons David and Keith Carradine. It rented and sold well, so they then put together the Sybil Danning-hosted Famous T&A (1982), a collection of nude scenes featuring well-known actresses. To directly rope in the horror fans, Wizard then compiled Filmgore (1983) the following year, which was hosted by Elvira. A few years later came ZOMBIETHON (1986), which highlighted mostly Euro-sleaze / gore flicks. Rival companies also whipped up their own tapes. Cameron Mitchell hosted the Continental Video release TERROR ON TAPE (1983), which also featured future Scream Queen Michelle Bauer in an early appearance. Rhino video followed with Battle of the Bombs (1985) and their Sleazemania series (1985-1992). Then came Bad Girls in the Movies (1986), a Vestron / Lightning release; HORRIBLE HORROR (1986), a GoodTimes release hosted by John Zacherle; CREEPY CLASSICS (1987), a Fox Lorber release hosted by Vincent Price; DRIVE-IN MADNESS (1987), an Imagine Inc. release combining trailers with interviews, and numerous others. Not limited to just home video, some of these things actually played in theaters. The Paramount release IT CAME FROM HOLLYWOOD (1982) featured Dan Aykroyd, John Candy, Cheech & Chong and Gilda Radner making fun of bad / old movies and grossed 2.5 million on the big screen. The biggest success though was Universal's corny Terror in the Aisles (1984), hosted by Nancy Allen and Donald Pleasence, which managed to rake in a whopping 10 million dollars in theaters. That may not seem like a lot these days, but it was double what the likes of Once Upon a Time in America and This is Spinal Tap made in theaters the same year.

Flash-forward to 2012 and Celluloid Bloodbath; yet another compilation of recycled trailers from the same guys who'd made the aforementioned Mad Ron's Prevues 25 years earlier. One question instantly arises: Is there really even a point to something like this anymore? I'm not so sure I can answer that. Needless to say, it's not 1987 any longer and anyone can see these same trailers any time they want online for free. However, this is also completely harmless, put together fairly well for what it is, has the right upbeat attitude and is not at all difficult to sit through, even for someone like me who's already seen most of these trailers before. Unlike with the original Prevues, this time the makers have enlisted the services of numerous horror and B movie celebrities to help link everything together. Some offer brief insight into films they actually starred in, others talk about movies they enjoy watching and some appear to have been ambushed at conventions and memorabilia shows for the brief bits they provide here. Either way, they're effectively used to help break up the monotony of sitting through trailer after trailer.

The opening sequence is set in a movie theater and a projection booth and features actor Joe Zaso, Scream Queen Raine Brown and the zombie puppet Happy Goldsplatt (voiced by Pawlow) introducing "the greatest horror exploitation trailers ever shown." The film then places the trailers - all 60s and 70s films - into 16 different categories. Most of the time they fit but on a few occasions they just seem to be thrown in wherever because they didn't fit anywhere else. Everything's neatly linked up with title screens, which introduce each segment, and the participants are all adequately introduced so we know who they are and why they're here. Good thing, too, because I wouldn't know who half these people were otherwise and I'm pretty well versed in the genre. Since there's not a whole lot else to discuss, I'll break this down by category so you know exactly what you're getting with this one...

• "Monsters," introduced by film historian Jack Polito. Trailers for The Twilight People (1972), FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR (1968), Baron Blood (1972), The Slime People (1963), They Came from Within (1975) introduced by Johnny Legend, the monster-free The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1971), Beast of the Yellow Night (1971) introduced by 42nd Street Pete and THE FLESH EATERS (1964). George Stover also says a few generic lines in a cemetery.
• "Carnival Horrors," introduced by The Great American Odditorium barker / curator Professor Ouch. Trailers for the Carnival of Blood (1970) / Curse of the Headless Horseman (1974) double feature, BERSERK! (1967) and SHE FREAK (1967) introduced by Legend. 
• "Supernatural Horrors," introduced by low budget actresses Amy Lynn Best and Sarah French. Trailers for THE EXORCIST (1973) and MEAT CLEAVER MASSACRE (1977).
• "Really Bad Movie Prevues," introduced by Conrad Brooks. Trailers for THE WORM EATERS (1977), Monsters Crash the Pajama Party (1964) introduced by Cinema Wasteland convention promoted Ken Kish, The Astro-Zombies (1967), MONSTER A GO-GO (1965) and LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD AND THE MONSTERS (1962).
• "Vampire Horrors," introduced by Hammer actress Veronica Carlson. Trailers for THE WEREWOLF VS. THE VAMPIRE WOMAN (1971), House of Dark Shadows (1970) introduced by French and GRAVE OF THE VAMPIRE (1972) introduced by Kish.

• "Blaxploitation Horrors," introduced by spokesmodel Jasmine Shields. Trailers for SUGAR HILL (1974), Alabama's Ghost (1973) and Scream Blacula Scream (1973).
• "Madness," introduced by horror hostess Carmela Hayslett. Trailers for EYEBALL (1975), RABID (1977) introduced by film critic and author Irv Slifkin, The Fiendish Ghouls aka THE FLESH AND THE FIENDS (1960), DON'T LOOK IN THE BASEMENT (1973) introduced by horror hostess Reyna "Miss Misery" Young, Mark of the Devil Part II (1973), the "whodunit and what did it?" double feature of The Black Belly of the Tarantula (1971) and THE WEEKEND MURDERS (1970) and THE BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN (1971).
• "Promotional Gimmicks," introduced by Kish. Trailers for CHAMBER OF HORRORS (1966; fear flasher and horror horn), THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH (1964; the first monster movie musical), Wicked Wicked (1973; split-screen "anamorphic duovision") introduced by Slifkin and Castle of Evil (1966; free funeral if you drop dead watching it).
• "Body Parts That Kill," introduced by Mr. Dead Guy, the Dapper Cadaver (some well-spoken guy wearing a tux and skull mask). Trailers for Asylum (1972) and The Crawling Hand (1963).
• "Psychos," introduced by actress Caroline Munro. Trailers for Psycho from Texas (1978) introduced by Linnea Quigley, Drive-In Massacre (1976) introduced by Ultra Violent Magazine editor Art Ettinger (Legend also discusses the film) and the double bill of Diabolic Wedding (1972), which is now considered a missing film, and Edgar Allan Poe's "Legend of Horror" (1972). Jesse Hess shows up at the end to bid farewell to his father, actor David Hess.

• "Killer Animals," introduced by (usually soft-porn) actress Darian Caine. Trailers for Rattlers (1976), Squirm (1976) introduced by actress April Burril and Willard (1971) introduced by Young and with goofy comments from actress Debra Lamb.
• "Baby Horrors," introduced by former child actress Denise Nickerson ("Dark Shadows;" the original Willy Wonka). Trailers for IT'S ALIVE (1974) and THE BABY (1972) with comments from Lamb and Burril.
• "T&A Horrors," introduced by Scream Queen Michelle Bauer. Trailers for Invasion of the Bee Girls (1973), THE DEVIL'S WEDDING NIGHT (1973) and Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (1975).
• "Women Treated Badly," introduced by former porn actress Seka (who flips off the government in her bit). Trailers for Girl in Room 2A (1973), CORRUPTION (1968), THE HANGING WOMAN (1972), Let's Scare Jessica to Death (1971) introduced by horror hostess Cindy Marie Martin aka Helena - Hussy of Horror, PRIVATE PARTS (1972), THE GORE GORE GIRLS (1972) introduced by Burril, W (1974) and Snuff (1976) introduced by Exploitation Retrospect editor Dan Taylor. Porn actress Ginger Lynn Allen shows up for a few seconds to bitch about Hollywood's sex / violence double standard.
• "Cannibal Horrors," introduced by Mr. Dead Guy. Trailers for Tender Flesh aka Welcome to Arrow Beach (1974), which "makes the killing in Snuff look like amateur night," The Severed Arm (1973) introduced by Ettinger and Cannibal Holocaust (1980) introduced by star Robert Kerman.
• "Dario Argento Films," introduced by Italian actor Giovanni Lombardo Radice. Trailers for Cat O' Nine Tails (1971), FOUR FLIES ON GREY VELVET (1972) and Suspiria (1977).

At the very end, we get to hear a little bit from William Forsythe, who says he's not a big horror film fan (way to throw some cold water on the proceedings!), and NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968) co-star Kyra Schon. Horror host John Zacherle aka The Cool Ghoul, sends us out. And that's all folks. 103 minutes. Over 60 trailers. The DVD is from Virgil Films.

★★1/2

Cathy's Curse (1977)

... aka: Cauchemares
... aka: Maldición de Cathy, La
... aka: Maledetto sortilegio (Cursed Spell)
... aka: Nightmares
... aka: Une si gentille petite fille... (Such a Nice Girl...)
... aka: Venganza de Cathy, La (Cathy's Revenge)

Directed by:
Eddy Matalon

In 1947, a man (Peter MacNeill) discovers that his wife has run off and taken their five-year-old son George with her, but has left their daughter Laura (Linda Koot) behind. The man cheers the sobbing girl up by telling her "Your mother is a bitch! She'll pay for what she did to you!" and then loads her up in the car. On the way to... somewhere... he swerves to miss a rabbit, crashes, there's a fire and the two of them burn to death. Thirty-two years later, a now-grown George (Alan Scarfe) decides to move back into his childhood home, along with his annoying, neurotic wife Vivian (the intolerably awful Beverly Murray) and their young and equally annoying daughter Cathy (Randi Allen). All of this raises some interesting questions right off the bat, such as... 1. If George's father died 32 years ago, why didn't he and his mother just move back into - or better yet sell - the home? 2. Once George turned 18, why didn't he claim the inheritance? 3. Why has no one lived in the house for 32 years? 4. Who has been paying for the utilities / upkeep on the house for the past 32 years? 5. Who has been paying the live-in maid or the caretaker who've been tending to the place for the past 32 years? Trust me when I say this is just scratching the surface of the stupidity on display.

As soon as the family move in, Cathy begins behaving strangely. She sneaks into the attic and locates Laura's creepy doll, hears voices going "la la la la la," sees Laura's reflection staring back at her when she looks into the mirror, starts shrieking when the doll is taken away from her and throws her cereal bowl across the room against the wall, something the elderly maid (Mary Morter) oddly and cheerfully shrugs off ("It's nothing, don't worry about it!") instead of having a sensible reaction like, say, "WTF is wrong with you, you little psychopath?!" Doors and windows open and close by themselves. The pet Doberman won't stop barking and later turns up dead covered in strange lesions. The house starts shaking. When some neighborhood kids come over to play, Cathy uses them to stage a reenactment of the 1947 car crash, makes a boy say "All women are bitches!" and then tries to poke out a little girl's eyeball with a stick. And then people start dying. Well, a couple at least. First up is the maid, who gets tossed out the window to her death after finding Cathy's precious doll. Mom sees the incident and afterward Cathy terrorizes her until she's put "... back in the nuthouse where she belongs."

A medium (Dorothy Davis), who can see the past through inanimate objects, has visions of the fiery car crash when she picks up a picture of George's dad, but just leaves afterward without saying anything. When she returns for a later visit, Cathy drives her away by calling her an "old bitch" and a "fat, dried-up whore." Apparently having not had enough, the woman returns a third time and is scared off again when Cathy makes some cackling old woman materialize out of thin air to call her an "extra rare piece of shit" and a "filthy female cow." The psychic lady does not return after that. And if you think keeping a psychic around is difficult, try finding a babysitter for this foul-mouthed little twat! The best the family can do after a certain point is to leave her in the care of the handyman (Roy Witham); who's a nasty old drunk.

After becoming possessed, Cathy develops many other special abilities. She makes objects move at will, shakes the entire house and can even cause things to explode. She can also make people hallucinate. During one scene, she makes Paul envision snakes, rats and tarantulas are all around him. She then makes her mom freak out thinking she's in a bloodbath and covered in leeches. Not enough? Well, she can also disappear and reappear at will, perfectly impersonate voices and make food quickly spoil and become infested with worms and maggots simply by staring at it. Before she knocks the maid out the window, she speaks in a deep male voice, but never again for the rest of the movie. It is never established whether the ghost of Laura wants revenge on George, wants to return to life via Cathy or just what it is exactly she is hoping to accomplish. The ghost even attempts to make Cathy drown herself in a lake at one point. Why she'd kill off her host body when she seems to be having a ball torturing everyone is one of many things that doesn't make a lick of sense.

Cathy's Curse is a terrible film. I mean a really terrible film. I could go into great detail about how awful it is but I don't have ten additional paragraphs in me right now. Best I can say is that it provides a few laughs (all unintentional, of course), just not nearly enough to make this worth sitting through. To makes matters worse, the only available English-language print on the market is in awful shape: blurry, horribly damaged and with this ugly faded discoloration that makes it look like someone took a piss all over the film's negative prior to it being transferred to tape. Having lapsed into the public domain, every other company under the sun has issued this same lousy print on DVD so it's easy to find in multi-packs for cheap or on various sites to view for free. Even f.o.c., you may still want your money back. The French (Une si gentille petite fille = "Such a Nice Girl") and Spanish (La maldición de Cathy) language versions are reportedly better-looking prints. Some releases contain a few extra minutes of footage. The one I viewed ran 82 minutes.

Shot in Montreal under the title Cauchemares ("Nightmares") in the winter of 1976, the budget was around 750,000 dollars. 21st Century released this theatrically in the U.S. in 1980.

★

Lizzie Borden's Revenge (2013)

... aka: Axe is Back, The
... aka: Lizzie Borden's Revenge: The Axe is Back

Directed by:
Dennis Devine

"We conjured up the ghost of Lizzie Borden and now her lesbian ass is haunting our sorority house?!"

In Fall River, Massachusetts in 1892, Lizzie Borden (Jenny Allford) chops up her religious fanatic parents (mom is played by veteran Scream Queen Brinke Stevens, who certainly deserves better than this boring cameo) because they disapprove of her being a lesbian. This first scene alone, with its terrible acting, an exterior shot of a house that looks absolutely nothing like the real Borden house (they probably should have opted for a still photo), barren porn-level "art direction" and hilariously bad CGI blood splatter, pretty much sets the tone for what's to follow. And it's not a pretty picture, folks. Things cut to modern day as seven sorority sisters face "punishment" for being caught (gasp!) drinking. So what does this punishment entail? Well, it involves missing a Spring Break trip to Florida and something about them being locked up inside Lizzie Borden's former house and being forced to have a slumber party dressed only in their lingerie.

During a game of Truth or Dare, nerdy Cindy (Kelly Erin Decker) decides that for her dare they all should hold a séance to call forth the spirit of Lizzie. One of the girls, Leslie (hardcore porno actress Veronica Ricci), happens to be a descendant of the Borden clan and immediately becomes possessed. The other girls are Amanda (Marlene Mc'Cohen), whose mentally-disturbed younger sister Vanessa (Krystal Ellsworth) has managed to sneak inside, Dee (Tiffany Mualem), who has severe anger management issues, Janice (Ginny You), who is an uptight tattle-tale, Ashley (Mindy Robinson), a tattooed, silicone-chested slut, and Mallory (Shanalynne Wesner), whose attempt to take naughty birthday pics for her boyfriend results in pervert photographer Bobby (Michael Beardsley) breaking into the house armed with a handycam to shoot material to upload onto his porno website. The above characters talk, and wander down hallways, and talk some more, and run up the stairs, and talk, and sit on the couch and argue and whine and argue some more. It's about as much fun as it sounds. Every once in awhile, Lizzie (in crappy dime store Halloween kit level makeup) pops in to kill someone off.

Even as a longtime fan of low-budget trashy horror flicks - including the same director's DEAD GIRLS (1990) - this sunk too low even for me. The acting is atrocious, the dialogue ("I'm not retarded... I'm mentally imbalanced!") and attempts at character arcs (like the photographer's sudden big 'coming out' moment... don't ask) are cringe-worthy, the makeup and fx are extremely lame, the editing is terrible... Well, actually, *everything* is terrible. Worst of all, it commits the biggest sin for one of these things by being extremely boring. Even several of the actresses getting naked doesn't help matters. The only one able to rise above the material is You, who seems to have a knack for comedy. I wouldn't mind seeing her in something else. Several of the other girls are nice to look at and a few even show hints of appeal or talent, as if they could be better given decent material, but this sure as hell isn't it.

The DVD is from TomCat films, who are also responsible for Aliens vs. Avatars (2011), Zombie Apocalypse: Redemption (2011), Jurassic Shark (2012), Isis Rising: Curse of the Lady Mummy (2013) and other garbage.

★