Rocktober Blood (1984)

Rock star Billy Eye Harper goes nuts and tries to kill his girlfriend and backup singer, Lynn Starling. Lynn escapes, testifies at his trial, and Billy is convicted for murdering twenty-five rocknrollers (!?)

Two years after his electrocution, Lynn is leading his band and ready to rock. She's recorded the song Billy wrote for her, Rainbow Eyes, a horrible pop metal song that will get stuck in your head and make you regret ever hearing it.

As Lynn prepares for her upcoming tour, she does aerobics, takes a vacation, and is stalked by Billy, who seems to be back from the dead. Problem is no one else ever sees him. So is Lynn insane or has Billy really come back from the dead?

Billy is supposed to be scary but he really looks more like Mike Reno from Loverboy than a singer in a metal band. I think a huge part of the problem is the headband. And the Kiss type makeup.

Frostbiter (1996)

Two idiot hunters on Manitou Island break a sacred circle of skulls and release the spirit of the Wendigo. Other hunters get stuck on the island in a snow storm and take refuge in the old shack that is within the broken circle. The shapeshifting Wendigo tries to kill them all before they can figure out that they must close the circle to contain it and save themselves.

The music throughout the film is too loud, which makes it really hard to hear the dialogue. There is some claymation like something out of a Ray Harryhausen film.

Arachnid (2001)

A ragtag band of scientists and their nature guides crash land on an island full of spiders when their plane mysteriously stops working. There is a subplot about the female pilot looking for her brother, a navy pilot who has disappeared while flying a new plane.

There is lots of icky spider spit and their webbing looks like cotton candy. The characters aren't too bright. One of the women falls into a hole, something grabs her, and she loses her shoe. A guy then sticks his frickin' head down the hole to retrieve the shoe, real bright.

Oh yeah, and the giant spiders are alien life forms that come from outer space. But don't let that fool you because it's only touched upon and overall the movie is not that interesting.

Thrillkill (1984)

Carly writes programs for video games, which sounds very cool until you realize that it's the early 1980s when computers were the size of a car and games were in he incredibly primitive DOS format. (Do kids today even know what DOS is?)

Carly has just finished programming a new game called Thrillkill. Perhaps this game was cutting edge in 1984, but I find that hard to believe it as it's not even up to the level of something like Berzerk, from the early 1980s.

For the past three years, Carly has been siphoning money from her employer through fake accounts. Caspar, the head of the company, has figured out something is going on and sets out to make Carly pay for her disgressions. Caspar has a voice like Dracula and uses random pauses mid-sentence, kind of like a cross between William Shatner and Bela Lugosi.

The convoluted storyline involves Carly's sister showing up unexpectedly with a friend, a secret password written on a book of matches, and location of the stolen money hidden within the game, which one must play and beat in order to enter the secret password. How inconvenient.

With twists and turns in the storyline, and no one who is actually what they appear to be, there is potential for a good movie. Unfortunately, it's not a very good storyline, or a very good video game. In the words of Thrillkill, "Welcome to Thrillkill, the game that plays you." Uh yeah, right.

Terror in the Swamp (1985)

A professor and his lackey experiment on a Nutria (a small rodent) to produce a large animal that can be hunted for it's giant pelt. The man sized rodent with a tail is running wild in the swamps, which anagers hillbilly brothers Jessie and T-Bob because their traps are being poached.

Rumors of a monster in the swamp prompts the offer of a reward for a fur-bearing animal weighing more than one hundred and fifty pounds. This sends tons of Cajuns into the swamps, riding in boats filled with shotguns and alchohol.

The sheriff decides to send Green Berets to locate the monster. They stomp carelessly through the woods and end up shooting at a kid, which makes one wonder if they are Green Berets due to the color of their hats, rather than any real military training.

There is a crazy swamp lady who laughs too much, T-Bob cries, and a shack explodes during a fight. The Nutria is never seem very clearly as it is too dark in the woods to tell what he looks like, but the one glimpse we do get appears to be a man in a shabby ape suit.

Also there is Officer Bruce, not the brightest guy on the force. When Bruce finds clear mystery liquid in a jug, he sniffs it and takes a big swig. He also decides it is a good idea to spray insecticide on the river where the drunken rednecks are boating during the monster hunt. The clouds of insecticide make it difficult for anyone to see and cause the hillbillys to discharge their guns, drive in circles, and drink even more.,

The Visitor (1979)

Eight year old Katie is an odd, creepy little child who finds a gun in a present box at her birthday, wields it like a lunatic and shoots her Mom, paralyzing her from the waist down. Mom hires housekeeper (Shelly Winters) who knows there is something evil about little spooky Katie. Detective Jake Durham (Glenn Ford) is investigating the birthday party shooting and knows there is something not quite right with Katie. But he doesn't get much done when a bird flies into his car and he promptly dies.

Katie scares everyone except super old Jersey (John Huston), who wears khaki outfits, babysits her, and has come to the US to walk on rooftops in front of a line of bald men holding boxes. While Katie dispatches everyone in her path, Jersey always has the upper hand in their interactions. Katie gets angrier and angrier until, in a scene right out of "Enter the Dragon", Katie chases Jersey into a room of mirrors. Her frustration grows as all she can find is his reflection, and in anger smashes mirror after mirror.

There is only one genuine scare in the film, which is when Mom comes home after leaving Katie in the hospital, but finds her playing Pong in the living room. Oddly enough Mom doesn't seem concerned as to why or how Katie has come home, but apologizes for their fight earlier in the day.

When creepy Katie turns around, she is a monster with light is streaming out of the holes in her face. She pounces on Mom, drags her to the second floor, and then throws her down the stairs. This is when Jersey sends the freakin' birds.

Anticipating the public fury over Jersey's birds of death, the movie ends with happy kids in hot Jesus Heaven, while Katie smiles and gazes about lovingly. To make the point perfectly clear and avoid the lawsuits for emotional trauma, we are then treated to the phrase, "We don't kill kids. We just kill evil." Well played, Jersey....well played.

Rise: Blood Hunter (2007)

Lucy Liu is Sadie, a reporter for a local paper, who stumbles upon a vampire, ends up his next victim, and wakes up in the morgue as a vampire with no idea what's happening. You'd think a vampire who decides to kill the vampires who killed her would make for an exciting plot, but you'd be dead wrong.

The movie is mostly Liu standing, walking, and staring. There is a whole lot of nothing in this movie, and what is there, is slow moving and often pointless. There are flashbacks all over the place and most come on without warning so it may take you a second to realize that the film has cut back to when she was human.

In one scene, she stands on the edge of a bridge, watching the traffic below before deciding to throw herself over the edge. The next thing we see, she is in a bed with bandages on her face, being nursed back to health by a man who says "Welcome to Mexico." So I guess when a vampire falls off a bridge, they land in Mexico. Uh yeah.....

On the plus side Sadie has a crossbow which only takes her 4.3 seconds to load. On the downside, she spends most of her time standing around doing nothing. Adolescent males should note that Liu is naked a few times during the film.

The Quick and the Undead (2006)

Ryn Baskin, a cut-rate, spaghetti western, Clint Eastwood type, collects pinkies from zombies as the US government has a bounty on zombie fingers. His rival, Blythe Remington - a soap opera name if ever there was one - steals Ryn's bag of pinkies, leaves him for dead, and plans to infect people with the zombie virus in order to make more money on pinkies.

The US looks like a spaghetti western, with dusty ghost towns dotting the landscape. Remington and his gang hole up in a huge building which isn't ideal for securing against zombies. Ryn, who is immune to zombie bites because he sucks out the poison, follows them to get his bounty back and havoc ensues.

The zombies are few and far between. While some of the makeup is pretty good, the zombies themselves are fairly lame and appear not to have any idea how to effectively stagger.

Terminal Justice (1995)

When I first looked at the cover, I thought it said Cybertech PhD, which sounded ridiculously awesome!  But alas, it was not to be.  Bobby Chase is  a cop who has night vision eyes due to a tragic eye accident during the war in Russia.  After his old partner is killed, Bobby vows to track down the killer.   

In another part of the plot, Bobby is assigned to protect an actress whose image was used for a virtual reality sex program.  There are threats to kidnap and clone her, so Bobby must be on guard.

Luckily it's 2008 and the police can link right into his night vision eyes so they see everything he does.  Yes, 2008..... a bad choice for a future film as it's not far enough into the future.  The computers of the future are laughable, and all the future technology is embarrassing.

Mutant (1984)

Two brothers end up in a small town where something is amiss. They find a dead body which disappears after they try to report it, making the local sheriff label them as troublemakers.  Then the younger brother disappears.  When the older brother tries to figure out what happened, he discovers that the town has a zombie problem.

Chiller (1985)

In the cryogenic storage chamber there are shuffing feet covered in tin foil. This rouses our guard to investigate, thus finding his replacement who jumps out from behind a storage tank, as well as a leak in one of the containers.

The leaky cylinder contains Miles Creighton, a big league executive who died ten years earlier. His mother couldn't bare to part with him and had him crygenically frozen until such time as the process of bringing the dead back to life had been perfected. Unfortunately the temperature in the container has dropped below the point where he can be refrozen and the only option is to attempt to revive the human popsicle that is Miles.

Thankfully Miles was wrapped in the finest tin foil known to man, thus preventing freezer burn, and doctors are able to revive him. He lingers in a coma until violent convulsions wrack his body, while an inept nurse fails to call anyone to assist him. Luckily it doesn't signal death, but life and Miles is deemed good enough to go home, where he immmediately creeps out his sister and finds that his dog hates him.

Mom declares her zombie son head of the company and he promptly throws out everything the company has done over the past ten years, including charitable activities, church donations, and snuffs out anyone who gets in his way. Even though he's super creepy, Mom worships him and hardly anyone questions what a jerk he is. No one even seems all that unnerved by the fact that he's been dead for the past ten years, which is very odd.

After the family priest figures out that Miles has no soul and Miles tries to rape his sister, Mom's brain starts cranking and she locks him in the freezer, only to send us right back into a loop to the beginning of the film where there are now multiple cryogenic container failures in the storage facility. Uh oh....

There is never any explanation for the tin foil feet in the opening sequence. Also it seems like a major design flaw to have to walk through the cryogenic storage room to get to the security control room. Their architect should be shot.

Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977)

When I think of Richard Burton and James Earl Jones, I think of two really great actors. So how the hell did they get into the mess that is Exorcist II?

While the movie asks if goodness brings evil upon itself, the movie's answer is a convoluted mess of nothing. Instead we get the Synchronizer, in which Father Lamont synchs up with little Reagan MacNeil via a hippie head band adorned with flashing lights. We are also treated to Reagan tap dancing to Lullaby of Broadway in the most disturbing see through hat, intercut with scenes of Father Lamont being chased and hit with stones while on his African trip to find the demon Pazuzu. Since the two are synched, the effect of the stones on Lamont's head causes Reagan to stagger and catapult off the stage during her tap dancing routine.

The film also features hordes of locusts, Dana Plato as a child who can't talk, a psychiatric institute with glass rooms which afford no privacy during treatment, Reagan's house of mirrors, and James Earl Jones in a giant locust suit. How could they go so wrong?

The most memorable moment of this movie is when Father Lamont tries to beat out a fire with a crutch. A crutch?!? How the hell is that going to help? In fact, if Lamont hadn't interfered, perhaps the flaming box of fire would have gone out after incinerating itself.

Instead Lamont's flailing crutch spreads fire throughout the basement passageway until Dr. Tuskin grabs a fire extinguisher to put out the flames. Yes, sad but true - there is a fire extinguisher in the hallway but Father Lamont chooses a crutch as a valid implement of fire fighting.

Nightmare at Noon (1988)

A mute albino in a van filled with computers puts a green glowing substance in a small town's water supply, which turns them into homicidal maniacs. Ken and Cheri Griffiths who are traveling through town in their RV and get trapped in town after the albino's minions turn on some sort of machine that generates a force field around the town. Sheriff George Kennedy and his deputy daughter try to control the town and stop the homicidal townsfolk from killing each other. 

Under Siege (1992)

Steven Seagal is Casey Rybek, a former navy seal who has been busted down to cook status after punching out a commanding officer. He's loved by the Captain and crew, except for a few officers who are sticklers and the irritating Commander Krill, played to annoying perfection by Gary Busey.

It's the Captain's birthday and Rybek is planning a special meal, but Cmdr. Krill locks the troublemaking Rybek in the meat freezer because he has plans of his own - namely flying in a stripper, band, and catering crew. Not the best idea when you're on a battleship carrying nuclear missiles, but no one really questions it.

Before you know it, the entire crew are locked below deck in the foc'sle, courtesy of Cmdr. Krill and the cut throat band mercenaries who came aboard under the guise of musicians and caterers. Led by the the animated Tommy Lee Jones as the currently insane fomer CIA agent William Stranix, the bad guys plan to load the nuclear missiles onto a stolen submarine, then sell them for millions of dollars.

It's a great plan except for one big problem and that hideous problem, such as it were, is Steven Seagal. Rybek's position as the cook belies the fact that he has special forces and counter terrorist training. Cmdr. Krill's disdain for Rybek as well as Rybek's propensity to state, "I'm just the cook," lead hijinks to ensue as Seagal proceeds to kill or maim everyone within a hundred foot radius.Under Siege is a fairly decent action movie and arguably Seagal's last flick before his expanding ego and waistline made his career self-destruct. After watching his recent films, I was stunned at how thin and young he looks here. It's too bad Seagal didn't have a better grip on why it's not a good idea to be in charge of everything on his own movies. If he had people around him who dared to say no, and who he was willing to listen to, then maybe he could have stayed on top of the action film genre.

The House on Skull Mountain

Wow! Check out Skull Mountain, how'd you like to have a house there? An excellent title and cool poster artwork belie the fact that this mediocre film is not so much about super creepy glowing eyed skull mountain, so much as it is about an old dead lady and voodoo. Thus it is a huge disappointment - unless you like voodoo films, which I don't.

Creaky old Pauline Christophe sends letters to her remaining kin, none of whom know her, and promptly kicks the bucket. When her long lost relatives arrive, they find Pauline in the ground and a surly butler who seems upset that the four descendents will be around for the reading of the will.

After the reading, the remaining Christophe's are stalked by death, which makes the living members wonder what the hell is going on. Particulary interested is Andrew, the only white member of the family, played by Victor French. Andrew is an anthropology professor at the University of Maine, and he wants to dig into the family history to figure out where he fits in the family. As he is only a few generations from Pauline, you'd think that would be fairly easy to discover without much research.

As the threat to the family members increases, the question becomes whether Pauline has come back from the grave for her voodoo revenge, or whether it is prehaps her snooty butler, who resents the family and is known to practice voodoo.

Anonymous Rex (2004)

Anonymous Rex proposes that dinosaurs did not become extinct, but currently make up ten percent of the Earth's population. The dinosaurs have developed hologram projections to disguise this fact. But they are able to identify each other by pheromones, particularly when sniffing the back of each others necks.

Dinosaurs have strategically placed themselves throughout society in positions of authority in order to help and protect their own kind. Their human disguises are so effective that they find themselves paying the price of never being able to truly be themselves, a conflicting burden indeed.

Daniel Baldwin, contrary to his usual questionable pseudo-acting, turns in a solid performance as one of two cops that are the main focus of the film. He and his partner discover there has been a rash of Dino-suicides and suspect that there is more to them than it appears, possibly murder.

The Dinosaur Cops (which would have been a much more enticing title for the film) are on the opposite political side from Raul, a dino who advocates unleashing hopped up, caraniverous dinos on the human population. Raul's theory is that this will start a war which will release the dinosaurs from their self-imposed prison of lies.

The film is a decent outing with an interesting idea, as long as you can stand some lame dialogue and cliche plot points.

The Being (1983)

Pottsville is a sleepy little town where nothing ever happens, unless you count the campaign to stamp out smt and the recent rash of random killings. Pottsville also boasts the "most sophisticated dump site in the country," which is something to be proud of, I guess, except that it apparently spawned the gooey icky monster that is killing everyone.

The town sheriff is constantly underwhelmed by the horrible events confronting the town, especially when he is face to face with large piles of goo. Even when the victim is his girlfriend...or wife or hooker. It's never clear what his relationship is to the human sized pile of gelatin in the bed, but since he was starting to take his pants off, he had some sort of intimate relationship with it. To add to the confusion, the sheriff is dating the girl at the local diner, which may be why he doesn't care that much about the monster made mess in his bed.

The town's mayor is involved in the cover up at the dump and is reminiscent of the mayor in Jaws who continues to deny any responsibility or possibility of a problem because it will cost the town lots of money. Once again, a mayor's concern about potential business earnings overrides the need for public safety and the sophisticated dumps place as a monster breeding ground is secure.

Scenes to watch for are: the opening scene with the kid running through the junkyard where day turns to night and back again; the junkyard kid crashing a car trying to escape the monster only to find the monster has somehow hidden in the trunk?!?;and the monster jumping on Martin Landau's back (now that's good movie making!)

Also listen for the music which sounds like someone has let a monster loose on the piano.

Chillers (1987)

Chillers is the story of five strangers stuck in a bus terminal late at night telling each other about their recent nightmares. Most of the actors are not very good and the stories all have fairly predictable outcomes. In fact, we had all seen this movie before, but none of us could remember any of the individual story lines. We didn't even remember the kid whose catchphrase was, "That's not scary." How could that not lodge in your head?

The stranded passengers nightmares are as follows:

1. female swimmer who has sex with dreamy diver who turns out to be dead
   
2. boy on camping trip whose scout leader is wolfy and crazy
   
3. woman in love with newsman on her tv who turns out to be vampire
   
4. guy who can bring the dead back to life with his thoughts accidentally revives psycho killer
   
5. college professor with interest in a local dig is targeted by evil deity in student who visited dig site
   

The concept about the guy who can bring the dead back to life is the most interesting. But there are far too many unanswered questions, among them why does everyone come back looking perfectly healthy and clean in their funeral suit? Also when you call the parents of a dead child to say that you've brought the kid back to life, why wouldn't they immediately hang up the phone? And the parent's actually drive into town to pick up their recently un-deceased kid, and don't seem creeped out by this at all. Yikes!

By far the worst story is the woman who is in love with the local tv newsman. As she stares longingly at the tv, she starts a monologue that begins, "You don't bring me flowers..." which made me think she quoting from the Neil Diamond song of the same name. Thankfully that was not the case, instead she chooses to be even crazier by stating that even though he never thinks about her, she's happy to see him every night on the tv. Then she scares the hell out of every sane viewer by saying one of the stupidest lines ever said with total sincerity, "I love you, newsman!"

The one problem with Hollywood's tendency to cast unnaturally good looking actors, is that when you see people on the screen who look like your next door neighbor, it's unnerving.

Also of note - the guy who can bring people back to life is one of the lead actors in Invasion of the Space Preachers.

The Dark (1979)

The city streets aren't safe after dark, especially when there's a killer with the nickname "The Mangler" on the loose. Mangler has been killing young women, but the blind man that is tip tapping along the dark streets every night better be careful. Look out man! Mangler's on the loose!...unless this is a very clever ruse and the blind man is the Mangler. Hmmmm....

Well that's just a bit too clever I guess, as the writers veer off into the wildly imaginative plot that The Mangler is really a space monster with laser eyes who sort of resembles Frankenstein. His laser eyes can even throw a man across a Monestery into a wall, which leads to the man exploding, woah! Sounds fantastic, but they only do it once.

William Devane plays a father searching for the serial killer that murdered his daughter, and looks like a cross between Steven King and Alice Cooper. With his David Cassidy shag, he feels comfortable walking around drinking coffee while wearing the world's ugliest bathrobe.

I love the dvd cover but the movie lacks excitement. And what's up with the blind guy? He's always tip tapping around the police out on the street during their investigations. Does he have some strange knack for walking near crime scenes? Or is he just completely lost, aimlessly wandering around town trying to figure out where the hell he is?

And what about the ending narration which states that "only the blind have nothing to fear in the dark." Huh? Is this to justify putting a blind guy in the film? Oh my aching brain!

Best dialogue:

"I could make a wild guess, but it would be wild and useless."

"Of the millions of possible alien encounters, man has had his first..."

"Mangler's a zombie.... Mangler's a zombie..." - newsboy on street

Drive Thru (2007)

Orange County's rich teens sure love their gangsta clothes, pool parties, and haunted houses for yearbook fund raising. They also love fast food restaurant Hellaburger, with it's creepy Horny the Clown mascot.

McKenzie and boyfriend Fisher accidentally use a ouija board at the end of their rocking pool party, and unleash a force that keeps leaving clues to let McKenzie know who is going to die next. Unfortunately the clues are so obscure that they aren't at all useful and McKenzie essentially spins in circles with a bag over her head, metaphorically speaking of course.

The first clue was the license plate number of her friends, who left the party early to get food at Hellaburger. It seems like a rich girl such as McKenzie should have better food than Horny the Clown, but I guess since these friends were the ghetto white rappers of Orange County, they needed to get their fast food fix.

Once McKenzie figures out that the kids who are dying all have a connection to her Mom's old high school friends, Mom is forced to reveal her horrible secret, and we're forced to admit that this is way too much into Nightmare on Elm Street territory to be a coincedence.

Killer Clowns are inherently spooky, and a drive thru clown with his big head and large metal plated mouth is just plain creepy. But the writing is so horrible that it is completely distracting and overwhelms anything you might be able to say that would be positive. Only those who want to see evil clowns or dont' care about the quality of their slasher flicks should watch this one.

Lastly I must comment about the darkroom scenes. McKenzie is horrified as she hangs up her 8x10 glossy prints to dry. They show her friends at the time of their death. But in order to make her prints, she would have had to: look at the negatives; align and focus them in the enlarger; expose the photographic paper; put the paper in the developer to keep an eye on when to remove it and place it in the stop bath; then leave it in the fixer for at least a few minutes. Also it is customary to do a contact sheet from the negatives before this process to see which negatives are worth printing. So her darkroom experience is just ridiculous.

But not as ridiculous as the fact that her prints were black and white, the dark room only had b/w enlargers, yet at the police station, her photos are miraculously in color?!

Stephen King's Desperation (2006)

A small town Sheriff who is possessed by an ancient spirit named Tak begins hauling highway travelers to the local jail, if he doesn't kill them first.

David, son of Ralph aka Max Headroom, has taken up praying and sees a vision of his dead sister who hands him a lump of glowing kryptonite, which turns out to be green soap. David soaps himself up, slips through the bars, gets a gun to kill the dog the sheriff left in charge, and releases the rest of the jailed victims.

Once outside, the group loses it's grip on cranial functioning and hides in the old theater. Rather than running away or sending someone to get help, they hang out on the stage and talk, thus ensuring the death of a few more of the characters.

For such an all powerful deity, Tak's well is extremely lame, and as his disembodied voice uselessly yells for one of our heroes to go away, we are left wondering how he took over the Sheriff's body and killed everyone in the aptly named desert town, Desperation.

The credits list someone as "pie carver". Oddly enough I have no idea who that is as no one was addressed by that moniker and no one carved any pies.

Scream Baby Scream (1969)

This is a movie about artists and the evil that they do. Art students Jason and Janet are dating. Janet admires the bizarre paintings of local legend Mr. Butler, who paints pictures of disfigured people. Butler's creepy art along with his sauve manner leave Janet smitten.

Jason is insanely jealous, and hates Butler and his stupid paintings. Jason, Janet, and their friends take LSD for the first time and go on a motorcycle ride - real smart. They trip out, start seeing double, go to the zoo, and imagine they are in the monkey cage acting like monkeys.

There are purply faced monsters that kidnap people. The makeup looks pretty sketchy, and their presence is never explained. I suppose they could be the monsters that Butler paints, except they are normal looking guys with a little grease paint on their faces.

After Jason and Janet have a big fight, Janet goes missing. When Jason searches for her, he ends up at Butler's house and havoc ensues. The makeup on Janet is disturbing but incredibly unrealistic. It looks a lot like papiermache attached to her face.

The film is along the lines of the ultimate in killing for their art movie, Herschell Gordon Lewis's Color Me Blood Red. I'd recommend that movie over this one, but this does boast lines like, "Yesterday's nightmare is today's dream and tomorrow's reality." Huh?

Casual Fridays (2002)

If you're one of those people who likes to watch or tape unintentionally funny and stupid things you stumble upon while watching tv, then you'll love Casual Fridays. It's over an hour of clips from tv shows and infomercials that will make your head spin. You'll see clips of a dreadlocked Billy Idol from his Cyperpunk period, painful public access talent shows, talentless acting, badly written 80s tv shows, Gary Coleman in court, news errors, and much more.

The dvd is put out by TV Carnage and there are other volumes available as well.

Primeval (2007)

A news team is sent to Africa to film and capture a giant crocodile that is terrorizing the people of Burundi. They are teamed with a croc expert and Jacob Krieg, a man obsessed with tracking and killing the big croc. Jurgen Prochnow, who plays Krieg, kept reminding me of Quint from Jaws, due to his preoccupation with the killing the great beast.

Krieg has constructed a cage that will hold the twenty five foot long croc, who he calls Gustave. Or rather, Krieg thinks it will hold Gustave since there is no way to test a cage made to contain a giant crocodile.

Gustave's skin is too thick for tranquilizer darts, so they use a tracking device. They shoot it into Gustave when he's underwater and it magically attaches itself to him. As darts can't pierce his skin, it's a mystery as to how they got the tracker to stick.

You'd think a giant croc would cause lots of excitement, but it doesn't. The movie is tame and predictable, and only for people who love mutant nature gone wild.

Mercenary For Justice (2006)

Steven Seagal is a mercenary...for justice. Seagal plays John Seeger - which inevitably kept reminding me of Pete Seeger and Bob Seger. As is always the case, Seagal's Seeger is the best mercenary on planet earth, which is why a notorious gun-runner kidnaps his dead pal's wife and son. Seeger's pal died in his arms on their last mission, and Seeger promised he'd care for his pal's family. Just how the gun-runner knew that these two people were the bargaining chips that would force Seagal to break into a maximum security prison to rescue the gun-runner's son is anyone's guess.

Parts of the movie are hard to follow since characters appear and disappear, and many scenes don't make sense. But I guess that isn't much of a surprise since this is Seagal. Plus the director's name is Don E. Fauntleroy, which has to be an excuse for this somehow.

CIA agent Dresham and the weasel-y foreigner Chapel both have odd makeup that makes them look way too tan. But at least they don't look like Seagal whose hair is dyed pure black and appears to have the consistency of straw, even in his pronounced widows peak. I must admit I like his wardrobe, which consists mostly of black suits and bright solid colored ties.

This is the only movie in which I have heard someone referred to as a "poophole." Huh? The thug who attempts to rough up Seagal in the men's room utters this insult before attacking. Luckily for Seagal, he's not much of an opponent. But it is unfortunate for the urinals, for when Seagal throws the thug into the wall, the urinals swing side to side because they aren't bolted to the wall, only hung on it?! One urinal even falls to the floor revealing no pipes attached and no hole in the wall where the urinal previously was hanging!

Also there is a scene in which Seagal is in the back seat of a car one second and the next he's across the street and around the corner escaping in a truck. At first I thought it was a continuity problem, but then a character acknowledges Seagal's speed by stating "That man's a ghost!" No! No, he's not! The guy is a freakin' bear!

Attack Force (2006)

Can there be a more generic title? It doesn't even follow the traditional three word titles that most of Seagal's movies use. This title screams out laziness on the part of the film makers. Why couldn't they come up with something better? How about: Attack Force Zero; Attack Force Lawson; Seagal's Attack Force; Attack Seagal's Force; Force of Seagal; Attack Seagal Attack? The possibilities are endless.

Steven Seagal is Marshall Lawson, the most awesome of the awesome elite military agents. After a mission, Lawson and his team take a much needed respite. That's when a few of the good old boys on Lawson's covert special ops team end up out for a night of fun with a prostitute. Too bad, as this floozy is using the new drug CXT which gives her superhuman strength as well an insatiable urge to kill everyone in sight.

Seagal and his young love interest (who I pray was paid very well) investigate the deaths and find that a French lunatic is planning to dump CXT into the water supply, turning everyone into killing machines. That just will not do!

Seagal and his posse set out to kill everyone on CXT, who are easy to spot due to their lunging at people with knives, as well as their freaky eyes which go from normal, to white, and back again. Seagal and the remainder of his elite group are so amazing that they figure out who to kill by looking at their eyes.

The distracting thing about the movie is that there is a fair amount of bad dubbing. The worst of this is the person who dubbed Seagal sounds nothing like him. If they are not showing a close up while he's speaking, you have no idea who is talking. Even in the close ups, the voice coming out of Seagal is confusing as it sounds nothing like him.

With all it's confusion, I do have a few favorite parts:
1. Seagal flails like a little girl during a fight scene (of which there are not many);
2. Seagal's nemesis says "As you know, revenge is a two way street" (huh?);
3. At the beginning of the movie, there is a title on the screen to let us know the location and it says "France, Europe."

I like to think that Seagal wrote both of those gems. (Did I mention he wrote this movie, which I'm sure is why he is referred to as even more super-awesome than he usually is?)

Also of note is that the photo of Seagal on the dvd cover and index appears to have been severely photoshopped as his face is thin, but in the movie Seagal looks like Bloaty McPufferfish.

Flight of the Fury (2006)

A bloated Steven Seagal plays John, a super special awesome Navy Seal who teaches other Navy Seals how to fly the X77, a top secret experimental stealth fighter which becomes completely invisible (gasp!) John is called in by "Eduards Air Force Base" because the pilot who took the stealth plane out for a test, stole it to sell to a foreign faction for tons of money.

I was prepared for confusion since Seagal is the writer. And after the last movie, it wasn't a big surprise to have someone else dub Seagal's voice at random points in the movie. But what I wasn't prepared for is that the most spectacular fantabulous Navy Seal in the world would have no sense of discretion. Instead of hiding the bodies of guards he's killed, he leaves them in plain sight, and instead of opening border gates, he drives right through them after killing the guards. How can this man be a super secret excellent Navy Seal? He's just plain sloppy.

Also the best elite military man in the universe should be more careful when he kills three robbers in a convenience store, especially when his actions are ham fisted and result in the death of the clerk. Seagal is so over the top that half way through the movie I felt like I was watching Will Sasso's Seagal impression on Mad Tv. Seagal has officially become a caricature of himself.

If you want to watch Steven Seagal movies, this certainly meets the criteria. But there's not much else to recommend it.

My favorite awkward lines from the film are:
1. "It's got technology that scares even the shit out of us."
2. "I don't know what they paid him, but whatever they paid him, it was a dump truck full of cash."
3. "Navy Seals are locked and loaded and ready to jump."

and I'm not positive about this because it sounds so stupid, but it's what I heard.
4. Did anyone see you? "Me. I'm scheduled not to be followed."

Desert Warrior (1988)

In the future the earth is a wasteland with warring factions, (isn't it always?) The underground dwellers live in radiation free cavern cities and wear exceptionally clean white future outfits. Those who live on the surface are dirty radiated ruffians who drive vehicles of the future - crappy old cars missing doors and hoods.

In order to propagate their tribe, Lou Ferrigno wears an eye patch and rides a lowrider to search for the perfect woman, which is a young woman who is not sterile from radiation. Lou eventually finds someone to bring to the leader of their clan, but the woman is not willing and manages to convince Lou that it would be a good idea for her to escape.

Part Star Wars, part Mad Max, part Dr. Livingston, and all crap, this movie boasts bad 80s tv music and Lou's enormous eye patch. There is also a little robot and rusty old cars that inexplicably explode and burn for days.

Strangest Dreams: Invasion of the Space Preachers

Friends Rick and Walt decide to take a vacation in at a rustic cabin and stumble across a crashed spaceship with an injured alien. They bring the alien to their cabin and put him in the barn. During the night, the alien's shell cracks and it turns into a hot chick.

The town they are visiting is inhabited by the fanatical religious faction called The Lash of God. There is also a cult of marijuana growing hippies who imprison Rick and Walt in a small bamboo cage. The alien chick discovers their capture and convinces the hippies to let them go.

The movie is full of whacked out mullets and bad haircuts. It's supposed to be a comedy. It's not very funny, but it did seem to have a certain charm to it. I'm not sure why because the writing and acting weren't stellar by any means. Perhaps I was so tired that it seemed okay.

13th Child: Legend of the Jersey Devil (2002)

The district attorney asks Kat to investigate the mutilation murder of an escaped convict found in the Pine Barrens, an area which the Jersey Devil is supposed to inhabit. The DA even goes so far as to suggest Kat keep her mind open because maybe the Jersey Devil is not just a local legend.

The film takes liberties with the actual legend, which will confuse anyone who has previously heard of it, and mislead those who haven't. It's like making a Bigfoot movie and portraying Bigfoot as a serial killer who rips the spine out of anyone who ventures into the woods - it's unnecessary, doesn't add to the story, and the actual legend can provide enough fodder for a good movie without changing the details. Also no one likes it when their local legends are changed, which immediately alienates a large portion of your built-in audience.

Kat, teams up with policemen Ron and Mitch, to investigate the killing and retrieve the mutilated torso. Near the scene, they find a giant "talon" - which in reality resembles a rock, or an indian arrow head, or a piece of coal, but definitely NOT a talon.

The three head over to the Shroud Mansion to visit Mr. Shroud, a strange and brilliant man, who spends his life studying reptiles, but apparently isn't much of a scholar as he tells Kat that the cobra is charmed by the clarinet!? Kat ends up staying overnight at Shroud's mansion, which seems like a really odd thing for an investigator from the DA's office to do, especially in the home of a very strange man.

In a parallel plot, former policeman Riley is locked in an old 1920s looking asylum due to his belief that the Jersey Devil is real and killed his partner. Riley keeps saying he's seen the Devil and claims that it's out to kill him also. The two plot lines conveniently converge near the end of the movie, although otherwise, they don't seem to have anything to do with each other.

The acting in this film is not good. Kat has no facial expressions and no emotion in her voice. It's like she's studied method acting from Steven Seagal. Even Lesley-Anne Down, who plays the DA, delivers her lines as if she's been forced to do the scene at gunpoint. Poor Robert Guillaume, another legitimate actor, gets some of the scripts real klinkers in his role as Riley.

I barely dare to mention the script, but there are scenes that go nowhere, numerous things that make no sense, and the monster's name is Bruno. The last scene with Mr. Shroud - in the foggiest basement ever - is utterly confusing and not clear as to what exactly is happening. Also, Kat is not a good investigator and doesn't seem too bright.

But perhaps the most confusing part is the chronology. The movie starts out in the woods, then cuts to "Present Day, October 31." Shortly after that we are treated to "three days earlier, Oct 28." What another flashback? Then to make things even trickier, we get "two days earlier, Oct 29". Huh?? It was just Oct 28, so...wouldn't two days earlier be Oct 26? Yes, of course it would, but this movie has decided to count everything from Oct 31, just to make it even more confusing. Quite frankly, they could have just gone in chronological order and not done this flashback stuff, but then it might make some sense.

Specters (1987)

Donald Pleasence is Professor Lasky who is in Italy exploring the catacombs that run beneath the city. When subway excavations reveal a hidden chamber, an inscription in it warns of the danger to come to anyone who reads it.

A tour group goes into the catacombs and a couple go off by themselves and get trapped by a cave-in. When the two get seperated the woman screams annoyingly about all the rats trapped with her.

Then in one of the most stupifying moves ever seen, she gets down on the ground and crawls into a burial area with a skeleton. I would think when terrified by a mass of vermin running all over the floor, the last thing one would want to do is lay down on the ground. It gives the rodents access to your entire body rather than just your feet.

It also makes the woman screech ever louder as she is afraid of the skeleton she is spooning up to, as well as the rats crawling all over the place. Not to mention it's just plain dumb to crawl into a hole where you can't be seen while screaming for help.

After finding the inscription, people die, someone gets sucked down into a bed, and lots of strange things happen. Unfortunately I can't tell you much about them as the movie put me into a stupor and by the time the night was over, my memory of what happened was fuzzy indeed. So that ought to tell you all you need to know about this film.

The only thing I was left with when this movie was over was wondering what would have happened if Lasky was the LOL Donald Pleasence.

Cemetery Gates (2006)

Animal liberators steal a massive crate from a scientists laboratory, randomly unleashing a murderous mutant tasmanian devil near an old cemetery. By no coincedence it just happens to be the cemetery that the scientist's son Hunter has rented for the weekend.

Hunter is filming a zombie movie with his friends. While he has big plans for the film, the cast consists of two girls and two zombies. An even bigger problem is that the zombies only have makeup on their faces, not their arms or exposed torsos.

It seems to be common knowledge that the cemetery has a series of old tunnels running under it. This is where Precious (the mutant tasmanian devil) chooses to hide. Yet when Scientist Belmont finds that Precious was released two miles from the cemetery, he wonders where she might be hiding. Belmont is so perplexed, it's almost impossible not to grab your head while screaming, "The tunnels!?!"

As for our monster, Precious digs perfectly round holes in the ground, which no one notices unless they fall into them. While Precious is a fairly stupid looking monster, I'm certainly thankful that this is a real monster suit rather than the crappy CGI that is in way too many movies these days.

The film's main characters are stereotypical horror movie college students with their smoking, drinking, and sexing. There is also a good girl and bad girl, sex starved irresponsible guys and a responsible guy.

While the film isn't great by any means, I really did enjoy how Precious killed as it was so different from what I expected. Precious jumps on the victim and her paws/claws move really fast as tons and tons of blood flies. The dead looked as if buckets of blood were dumped on them. It was so over the top that it was not grotesque.

As for the zombie aspect of the film, it was sadly lacking as the only zombies were the two college students in makeup, and no real zombies ever appear.

Satanic (2006)

After surviving a car crash, Michelle wakes up in the hospital with her head wrapped in gauze and a brain full of amnesia. She has nightmares about the crash, and doesn't recognize herself.

Dr. Barbary, played by the fantastic Angus Scrimm, tells her that she is being transferred to a place called Harmony House, where she will be with kids her own age, which should help in her recovery.

Harmony House is run by the super creepy Bisson and his horrible wife Jackie. Bisson is a little too interested in the young girls, and Jackie accuses poor amnesia-addled Michelle of being interested in her gross husband. Bisson, who packed Michelle's clothes, included lacey nightware, but Jackie blames Michelle. She confiscates Michelle's belongings and as punishment, refuses to give her dinner. Jackie also calls both girls sluts and whores, and has an extremely distasteful disposition.

It is a mystery as to how these two can get kids into Harmony House. It is literally a regular family home, not a group home, and the two don't seem to know anything about helping kids. Bisson makes an attempt at a group session, but he regularly insults the kids and calls them jerks. Jackie is even worse as she takes all the kids belongings and sells them on ebay. The two also make money by selling prescription narcotics that are supposedly going to the kids, and get money from the state for taking care of the kids.

It isn't clear as to why Michelle has been put in a home with juvenile delinquents. Amnesia is her problem, not delinquency. Bisson and Jackie seem incapable of helping messed up kids, let alone one with trauma to the brain. Is it normal for teenage amnesia victims to be released into the care of group homes rather than some sort of psychiatric facility or hospital equipped to deal with this problem?

In Michelle's possession is an elaborate oujia board, and a diary with a pentagram. The diary talks about killing her father and needing his blood for a ritual, but Michelle has no recollection of any of it. Her roommate Dahlia convinces her to have a seance as it is "a form of therapy." Never heard that one before, but I guess since Michelle has amnesia she buys it.

Everyone at Harmony House starts thinking Michelle is dangerous, except for Larry who believes she is sweet and kind. But as the killings start, the question becomes is Michelle the killer and what really happened on the night of the car crash?

While the name of the movie suggests a high satan content, it doesn't come into play for the most part. This movie is another in which there is too much dialogue that isn't very interesting. The twist ending seemed contrived, and has been done better in other movies, but will probably work for some viewers.

One thing that eventually drove me nuts was the repeated footage of Michelle driving up in a van next to a person in a hood and asking them if they wanted a ride. I'm not sure how many times this was repeated in the film, but it happened far too often, and the payoff wasn't worth it.

Demon Hunter (2005)

When an exorcism fails, Jake Greyman is called in to take care of the possessed girl by beating her senseless and stabbing her with his pointy cross. Jake, who is working for the church, is teamed up with a young nun named Sister Sarah to fight the forces of evil. The church's goal is to stop the demon Asmodeus from impregnating Los Angeles prostitutes, in an attempt to birth an evil demon. Yup, that's going to be one classy demon.

While Jake and Sister Sarah, who wears street clothes rather than a nun's habit, run around town trying to track down where Asmodeus will strike next, they argue about good and evil, demons and humans, kindness and killing, etc. It is the classic retelling of the story of Dirty Harry being paired with the new young female cop who can't quite get up the nerve to fire her gun.

At one point a policeman finds Jake and Sarah in someone elses home. Jake immediately grabs the cop around the throat, but Sarah begs Jake not to hurt him as he's just doing his job. Eventually Jake releases the poor cop, who falls to the floor, immobile. And when Jake speaks to the Cardinal, he states that he has left the cop incapacitated. Oddly enough the Cardinal is okay with incapacitating others.

While not a horrible film, it's also not a particularly interesting one either. There is far too much dialogue, which wouldn't be a problem if it were relevant but its not. Or when Asmodeus states "I take what's not given to me", all I could think of was, does that mean he does not take what is given to him?

The demon horns and hands weren't very inspiring either. Rather than the demon hands inspiring fear, all I could think was that they were little piggly wiggly hands, which isn't scary at all.

I must mention that there was one line in the movie that was so horribly written that it made me laugh out loud. It was uttered by Sister Sarah when she said, "She was an orphan, and her parents were dead." Bwaahahaha.... Yes, I'm glad you let me know that the orphans parents were dead, otherwise I would have tried to call them. Thank you oh so much, Sister Redundant Nun!

Return of the Living Dead: Rave to the Grave (2005)

After Julian's uncle is killed, Julian finds a secret room in his attic which contains two barrels, which are the property of the US army. Julian and his girlfriend Jen decide that it would be a good idea to see what is in the barrel. So they cart it over to his friend Cody, a science major.

Although Cody isolates several elements contained in the liquid siphoned from the container, he can't specify what it is or if its dangerous. This doesn't stop the mentally deficient rave dj Jeremy from dipping his finger in it and tasting it.

Soon after, Jeremy starts hallucinating as well as drooling. When he snaps out of it, he professes the trip was awesome and they can get rich selling it.

Julian wants no part of this as they don't know if it has side effects, or even what is it, and says he'll be back the next day to pick up the barrel. Cody proves to be a poor scientist - as well as a poor friend - when he and Jeremy immediately make the liquid into pill form, and sell it to the college drug dealer. The new drug called Z (because it makes you so high you act like a zombie) is all over campus by the next day.

While Jeremy is setting up for his big rave in the desert, Jen discovers the barrel is now open and whatever was in it has left slime on the floor. Julian and Cody rush to the lab to investigate and all three run into freshly dead zombies, Interpol agents, and the slimey zombie from the barrel.

The barrel zombie manages to escape, and it finally dawns on Cody that it was a really bad idea to sell pills made from the mystery liquid. While Interpol, Julian, Jen, and Cody rush out to Jeremy's rave in an attempt to stop the sale and consumption of Z, the barrel zombie tries to hitch a ride on the freeway.

Anyone who takes three pills of Z at once immediately becomes a zombie. Those who consume one pill at a time take longer to die, first developing a cough and feeling cold. Eventually all the characters end up at Jeremy's big rave, where its a race to see if they can stop the sale of Z to the rave crowd, as well as save Jeremy from the side effects.

The questionable premise of Jeremy tasting the liquid from the barrel isn't believable. Would anyone really be so stupid that they would taste liquid from a mystery barrel with a US Army logo on it? Is the quest for a new high so mind numbing that they would have no concept that this stuff could be toxic waste or have horrendous side effects? What if it was some sort of agent orange rehash?

And as if tasting the liquid wasn't annoying enough, the character of Jeremy appears to be based on the ideas of a forty year old who had watched a ten year old documentary on techno. Jeremy was so annoying, I wanted to smack his hat right off his head and kick him in the hinder.

If you're looking for a good zombie movie, this isn't it. The characters are stupid and annoying, some of the acting is pretty bad, and the plot is too contrived. But if you're interested in seeing a random zombie movie or watching ravers get attacked by zombies, this movie will do.

Caved In: Prehistoric Terror (2005)

Christopher Atkins is John Palmer, a cave guide whose wife, bratty teenage daughter, and trying-to-prove-he's-manly teenage son help out with his tourist day trips. But John is not just any spelunker, he's a reknowned cave guide who is hired by a group of Europeans to travel deep into an old mine where rumors have it there is a cache of emeralds. Unfortunately the rumors forgot to mention that there are also man-sized bugs with giant pincers that will tear a person in half, which is why the mine was abandoned in 1948.

John leads the group into the mine, where they find the electricity still working, as well as the elevator. Honestly, I can't imagine anyone getting into a wooden elevator that hadn't been used in over fifty years, jumping up and down on it, declaring it safe, and loading it with people. There seems to be no concept that after so many years of disuse, especially in a cave, that the pulleys and other mechanisms might not be safe or work properly. There is also no thought of how they might get out of the mine shaft, which is over 300m deep, if the elevator ceases to function, and no thought of the possibility of methane in the long closed mine. Just what sort of reknown does John have anyway?

John's lack of brain power compells him to swing across a gap where the wooden walkway has decayed (but what if the other side can't support his weight?!). He smartly advises the group to stay against the wall due to the possible unstability of the edge of the cliff, and then proceeds to practically step off the edge himself.

In subplots, John's teenage daughter likes the young killer Stephan, and John's son tries to prove he's a man by going down into the mine on his own. Not only does the boy break a rung on the ladder, falling like a sack of potatoes onto the dirt floor, he also rides down into the mine on the old elevator, swings across the fallen walkway, and traipses deeper and deeper into the mine on his own - perhaps he is looking for his brain.

The cgi bugs look really bad. Not that they don't look like human sized bugs, but they appear to be bugs sitting on top of a photo, not actually in the photo. It's very disconcerting in the scenes where the humans are screaming in terror, when it is obvious the bugs are not even on the set.

Not a good movie, although sometimes it's stupid enough to be amusing. To quote from one of the characters who I can't even be bothered to remember, "Are you seeing what I'm seeing?!? Your plan's not just being ripped apart. It's being ripped apart by giant bugs!"

Shark Zone (2003)

Jimmy Wagner has nightmares about the day he was scuba diving with his father, a former navy seal, and the sharks arrived. Dad had taken some tourists to dive near a shipwreck, but the arrogant tourists thumbed their noses at his safety tips and went off on their own. This act of ignorance made them prime shark bait and the only person to come up from the dive was Jimmy.

With the back story in place, we cut to ten years later where Jimmy - having not aged a day - has a hot wife, a young son, and a job watching over the beaches. The upcoming festival has everyone excited, especially Mayor John Cortell, as crowds will flock to the town and take advantage of their lovely beaches and water sports, which translates to mucho tourist money.

Unfortunately it is at this time that Jimmy's past comes back to haunt him. The festival is sponsored by the evil Russian Volkoff, who insists on going out to the old shipwreck and having Jimmy guide him. There are supposed to be diamonds on the wreck and Volkoff wants them.

It is also at this point that the sharks start eating humans again. It always happens right before the big holiday weekends or summer festivals. With stock shark footage a-swimming, Jimmy insists that the Mayor shut down the beaches! But damn it, the mayor is not going to ruin the festival, or alienate the sponsor, Volkoff.

With cries of "You need to shut down the beaches" and "Everyone out of the water - we've got sharks!", plus a mayor who refuses to risk the town's revenue against a man who refuses to risk people's lives for profit, you end up with a sub-par version of "Jaws".

Jimmy is a fairly useless hero as much of his shark hunting is done by looking through binoculars, watching his friends get mauled in shark cages, or dropping bombs into the ocean in random attempts to kill any shark that happens to be in the area at that moment.

While it is essentially a poorly done rewrite of Jaws, there is some laugh value in it's lack of logic, ridiculous plot points, Volkoff's inarticulate mumbling, and the fact that the actor who plays Jimmys dad is the same one who plays the mayor. With meaningless lines like, "If you mess with this festival, it's going to be more vicious than a shark attack!", how can you not laugh?

The Bloody Dead (1967)

aka Die Blaue Hand

David Emerson is locked in an insane asylum for murders that he claims were committed by his twin brother, Richard. David's room is filled with manikins in various poses, including two hanging from the ceiling in nooses. No idea why, but it certainly gives the appearance that he's not right in the head.

When David escapes from the asylum, he heads back to the family mansion. A guard from the asylum tracks him to the house, enters the corridors which are lined with suits of armor, and is killed by someone wielding The Blue Hand, an armored glove with knife tips at the end of each finger. Spooky.

David pretends to be his twin brother Richard, which works okay as Lady Emerson was never able to tell them apart. Richard has disappeared, but since David is there, no one realizes it. Head of the asylum, Dr. Montague, is involved in many nefarious doings, and eventually slips a mickey to the detective looking for David. I still can't believe the guy drank it.

The cover made the film appear as if it were a bloody living dead movie. While it wasn't that at all, it did turn out to be very entertaining.

Honeymoon of Fear (1972)

aka Fear in the Night

Young bride Peggy, who recently suffered a nervous breakdown, is repeatedly attacked by someone wearing a black glove and a fake arm. Her husband Robert is skeptical and thinks it is her imagination.

Robert and Peggy move into an apartment at a boys school, where Robert has a job. As Peggy wanders the empty corridors, she hears a class being taught. But when she opens the door, the room is empty. As she looks around the room, headmaster Michael steps out behind her, giving her a start. Michael shows Peggy around the school before creepily getting his hand stuck in her hair while assisting in letting her hair down.

Back at the apartment, Peggy is attacked by the black-gloved, fake-armed man. Once again, her husband thinks she's imagining things. At this point, things were moving so slowly, the tape came out of the VCR.

This is a Hammer film, which explains the slower pacing since British films concentrate on dialogue rather than action. Peter Cushing as headmaster Michael, was suitably strange and interesting. Joan Collins played the typical bitch, which she does so well. But the film moved too slowly, especially after viewing the cover photo and description on the back.

Assassin (1986)

When Robert Golem, a killer robot built by the CIA, runs amuck, retired agent Henry Stanton is called to help capture him and protect Mary Casallas, an agent who helped program Golem. Mary informs Henry that the only way to stop Golem is to shoot him in the stomach, as this is the only vulnerable part of his body and where his brain is housed. The only other Achilles heel that Golem has is he must recharge every seventy-two hours via a 220 outlet... using his built-in extention cord. During this thirty minute recharge, he can not defend himself.

This isn't a great movie, but there are a few unintentionally funny bits, such as Henry telling Mary it's safe for her to enter her apartment as he's searched the entire thing, except for the locked closet. Cut to an alarmed Mary exclaiming "what locked closet?", as Golem bursts through the closet door. Oh Henry.... maybe you shouldn't have come out of retirement.

Sledgehammer (1983)

Sledgehammer has to be seen to believed. It is a low tech, shot on video film with the most excessive use of slow motion footage I have ever seen. It's like your uncle just got a new camcorder - back when they were massive things that had to sit on your shoulder - and he was experiementing with the new slo-mo feature.

There doesn't seem to be any reason for it either. It appears totally randomly and makes the movie unbearable. There are slow motion scenes of luggage throwing, walking in a field, walking in a hallway, shutting a door, turning a doorknob, people listening to a scary story, fighting, falling, and more of the same all over again.

The story is about a bunch of friends who plan to stay the weekend in an old cabin that hasn't been lived in for ten years due to murders that took place there. While the outside shot looks like an old cabin, when the gang goes inside, it looks like a modern day condo.

The group is supposed to be a fun loving bunch, but they act like idiots. They make lame jokes, have a nasty food fight, and get drunk. There's a subplot that goes nowhere involving the main couple who aren't sure whether to get married, even though the guy already asked her and she said yes.

Chuck, the muscular blond leading man, decides to have a seance where they will try to contact the spirits of the two people murdered by a sledgehammer in the livingroom. The story is that a man and woman were having an affair in the cabin. The woman locked her little boy in the closet so he wouldn't get in their way. The two adulterers were murdered, but the little boy was never found.

As Chuck weaves his tale of death, his friend goes into another room and uses a boombox to play a tape with a spooky voice, which is supposed to fool the others. Chuck's seance also awakens the hulking ghostly sledgehammer killer, who has apparently just been waiting for someone to have a seance in the cabin.

The killer goes to the room with boombox and kills the friend....with a knife. But what about the sledgehammer he was carrying? Where'd he get the knife? No explanation is ever offered. The rest of the killing is done with a sledgehammer but its extremely tame. There isn't much blood and other than the opening segments sledgehammer to the back of the head, there aren't any special effects - just blood smeared on people.

There is a soft focus on some scenes, which is pointless. The hallway is the narrowest hallway in existence, (you wouldn't be able to get any furniture through it). At one point, the killer appears in the hallway, and you can see that the "wall" behind him is not even attached to anything as there is a big gap on the left side. Also the killer must widen his stance to step over the cameraman who is shooting from the floor.

There are flashbacks in the film which are the exact same footage from earlier in the film!??! We've already seen it, and even if they felt the need to refresh our memories, they didn't have to show the entire scene.

The acting is subpar. Chuck does a really bad Bill Murray imitation during one drunken scene. No one can realistically imitate being drunk, which is a problem since much of their time is spent drinking. The food fight scene in the kitchen is really strange, and its just plain gross watching the guy in the football jersey shove an entire sandwich into his mouth.

I liked the record player in the cabin, but they were listening to 45s and had no spindle to stack them on. This means that someone is going to have to get up to change the record every two to three minutes, which is not practical during a party.

The killer is a huge hulking figure in a clear halloween mask - the ones that bank robbers used to wear during the 70s. He appears and disappears randomly. Then he changes into the little boy who was locked in the closet. Then he changes back to the hulk. Why?

We are left with so many questions and no explanations. Why does the killer randomly change into the little boy and back again? If the little boy died, then why is the killer a behemouth instead of a little boy? How and where did the boy die? Since he was never found, he didn't die there, so why is his ghost haunting this cabin? Why would a seance bring back the killer instead of the victims? Why does the sledgehammer randomly appear and disappear? Is it a ghost? If you have a sledgehammer and you're huge, why would you kill someone with a knife?

The scariest thing about this movie is the hair. This is 80s blow dried hair at its worst. The guy with the massive mullet blow dry do and mustache is the scariest. But the lead couple both have the same mullet so that's not very pleasant either.

Parasite (1982)

When Parasite was originally released in theaters, it was in 3D. While the effect is not used in the home video, we do get the benefit of the odd shots of things coming towards the camera: a steel pipe pierces a body and blood flows out; a thug sticks his fingers into the parasite tube; a gun barrel points toward the audience; a parasite falls from the ceiling, and even parasites bursting from flesh.

The story starts with Paul, a scientist with a moldy parasitic stomach, who heads out into the post apocalyptic landscape, ending up in Joshua, population 64. There is a distinction made between city fellas and the lawless rurals who only accept silver in payment for services. Gas is $40 a gallon, and the local eatery only has canned fruit, canned beer, and canned soup, which is apparently scarce. The other major difference is the city people have laser guns and fancy vehicles, while the rural faction has shotguns and beatup old cars with no hoods and missing doors.

The towns inhabitants are decent citizens, except for the local gang of annoying twenty somethings who appear to be trying to terrorize people, but mostly seem to annoy them. The only person afraid of them is our scientist friend Paul, who tells them he doesn't want any trouble and begs them to let him go. Well, as everyone knows, that is a sure way to keep being harrassed by a bully. The gang drag Paul and his parasite cylander to their hangout in an old garage, and even though Paul warns them not to open the tube, they do, unleashing the parasitic horror that awaits within.

Within this frame work there is also: Demi Moore, the lemon grove girl, who provides fresh lemons to the bar owner; the Merchant, a city dweller who works for the same company Paul did and is trying to track down Paul and his parasites; and old Ms. Daly, the hotel owner, who looks like an olde tyme movie star, what with the makeup, 8x10 glossys on the wall, and the star painted on her door.

If this movie had been like "Piranha", it would have been fantastic. Unfortunately it appears that the emphasis was on the 3D aspect rather than excitement. The pacing of the story is very slow, especially when you're expecting to see something - anything - happen relating to parasites and carnage.

School of Death (1975)

aka El Colegio de la Muerte.

Matrons at a girls orphanage send girls to a melty-faced scientist's mansion where he straps them down and pokes a sharp object into their brain. Obviously this does not have a positive outcome, and the girls die. I'm confused as to what he was hoping to accomplish since he did the same thing to each girl. You'd think he'd try something different if his objective was something other than rendering them dead.

The film takes place in London in the 1800s, and has a feel very much like the Hammer films. It has no blood, guts, or nudity.