A surprising (and obviously erroneous) entry on the DPP
list, Dead and Buried is an old fashioned, often chilling, low key
horror yarn, co-written by Alien and Return of the Living Dead
writer Dan O'Bannon.
James Farentino is a cop investigating
strange goings-on in a sleepy New England fishing town. Jack Albertson,
in his last screen role, plays a mortician who knows more than he's telling...There's
one or two great shocks and a Fulci-esque hypodermic-through-an-eyeball.
Director Gary Sherman's first feature
was the 1972 cannibals-on-the-Underground flick Death Line, starring
Donald Pleasence and Christopher Lee.
Dir. Gary Sherman; Prod. Robert Shusett, Robert Fentress; Scr. Robert Shusett, Dan O'Bannon; Star. Jack Albertson, Melody Anderson, James Farentino; With Lisa Blount, Nancy Locke Hauser, Dennis Redfield
UK Vid. Thorn-EMI, QRT 91 min (unrated), Beta &
VHS; The Video Collection, QRT 91 min (BBFC:18), VHS only
Tobe Hooper's follow-up to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
(1974) provides the first indication of how disappointing much of his further
career would prove to be. But acts like that don't get any tougher to follow,
and there is nevertheless plenty in Death Trap to confirm Hooper
as a talented genre director.
In this black comedy which marries
elements of Psycho, Murders in the Zoo (1933) and, of course,
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Neville Brand plays a scythe-wielding
bayou hotel proprietor with a man-eating pet crocodile. No prizes for guessing
what happens to a succession of hapless guests.
The script, inspired by the EC swamp
stories of 'Ghastly' Graham Inglis, reunited Hooper with Chainsaw's
Kim Henkel. Wayne Bell also rejoined Hooper to work on the score which
reiterates the musique concrète motifs of Chainsaw.
Marilyn Burns, Hooper's heroine in his first film joined in again, and
there are numerous 'star' victims in the shape of Stuart Whitman, Carolyn
Jones and Mel Ferrer. (The film should not be confused with Umberto Lenzi's
Eaten Alive (aka Mangiati Vivi, 1980) which also features
Ferrer.) Freddy Krueger star Robert Englund also makes an early appearance.
Largely due to ham-fisted distribution
and too many territorial title changes, the movie never really found an
audience and it was to be five years before Hooper returned to the big
screen with The Funhouse (1981).
Dir. Tobe Hooper; Prod. Mardi Rustam, Alvin
L. Fast; Scr. Tobe Hooper, Kim Henkel; Star. Neville Brand,
Marilyn Burns, Mel Ferrer, Carolyn Jones, Stuart Whitman; With Roberta
Collins, Robert Englund, William Finley, Kyle Richards
Despite years of bickering with Ruggero Deodato over who
can claim this particular accolade, it is Umberto Lenzi who enjoys the
dubious distinction of having pioneered the Italian third world cannibal
movies with Deep River Savages. Although the film features only
three minutes of actual cannibalism, that would prove sufficient to spawn
an entire cycle of mangiati vivi pictures that was to span a decade.
The film owes more to A Man Called
Horse (1970) for its narrative, and the mondo shockumentaries
for its gruesome incidentals. On the whole the gore sequences are relatively
tame (although there is a breast-eating sequence that would be replayed
in Jorge Grau's 1974 The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue and
Andrea Bianchi's 1980 Burial Ground). Needless to say there is the
cycle's customary sickening propensity to film the genuine slaughter of
animals to enhance the picture's 'authenticity'.
Though not a smash hit by any means
(except in Japan where mondo movies continued to play to packed houses)
Deep River Savages was successful enough for Lenzi to return to
the jungle in 1980 for the rather more visceral Eaten Alive.
Dir. Umberto Lenzi; Prod. M.G. Rossi; Scr. Francesco Barilli, Massimo d'Avack; Star Me Me Lay, Ivan Rassimov; With Ong Ard, Prapas Chindang, Pratitsak Singhara, Sulallewan Sunwantat
UK Vid. Derann Film Services, QRT 88 min, Beta,
VHS & V2000
There are lots of killings and Nam flashbacks in this
tale of a traumatised Vietnam vet escaping from an asylum and killing everyone
in sight before ending up in the employ of right-wing local government
officials who hire him as a vigilante.
Quite how this low-rent 16mm feature
ended up on the DPP's 'video nasties' list is anyone's guess.
Dir. Peter Maris; Prod. Sunny Vest; Scr. Peter Marris & Richard Yalem; Star. Turk Cekovsky, Debi Shaney; With Garret Bergfield, Terry Den Brock, Chris Chronopolis, Jack Garvey, Harry Gorsuch, Mie Kallist, Myron Kozman, Nick Panousis, Lloyd Schattyn, Barron Winchester, Bob Winters
UK Vid. VTC, QRT 84 min (unrated), Beta & VHS;
VIZ Movies, QRT 84 min (cut 16", BBFC:18), VHS only; VidAge, QRT 84 min
(cut 16", BBFC: 18), VHS only
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DEMONS
aka Demoni (It.); Titanus, Italy, 1986; 88 min |
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The film is set on the re-opening night of an old Berlin cinema. A sinister
masked man (an amusing cameo by actor/director Michele Soavi) prowls the
local subways handing out out free tickets. The main feature is a tedious
eurostyle gothic, but the unimpressed patrons soon sit up when events in
the cinema start to copy those unfolding on the screen. A hooker at the
movie with her pimp cuts her face fooling about with an ornamental mask
in the foyer — soon the wound is revealed as the source of a contagion
which turns hapless victims into bloodthirsty demons. Panic spreads and
the patrons rush to the exits only to find they have been walled in. As
the heavy metal soundtrack pounds away the cinema becomes a battleground
with the patrons desperately trying to survive the night as one by one
they fall prey to the ever increasing demonic hoard.
Produced by Dario Argento and expertly directed by Lamberto Bava, Demons
is a well-edited action/horror film — a kind of dead straight spaghetti
Evil Dead. From the moment the film-within-the-film starts rolling
the pace never lets up and there are enough shocks and surprises along
the way to prevent the audience becoming inured to the sense-numbing onslaught.
Argento’s influence is clear — Bava was Argento’s assistant on Tenebrae
(1982), and the lighting and photography are frequently reminiscent of
Suspiria — and Sergio Stivaletti’s fx put him right up there with
fellow countrymen Rambaldi and de Rossi.
Despite Kim Newman’s description of it as “a triumph of illogicality run
riot”, Demons was a smash hit in Italian cinemas and a big success
internationally on video. During a period in which horror audiences were
condemned to watch hour after hour of gutless purile tripe, Bava’s technically
and dramatically absorbing opus shamelessly bucked the trend and fans loved
it — even if the critics didn’t.
Dir. Lamberto Bava; Prod. Dario Argento; Scr. Dardano Sachetti; Star. Urbano Barberini, Natasha Hovey; With Fiore Argento, Paolo Cozzo, Bobby Rhodes
UK Vid. Avatar, QRT 88 min (BBFC: 18), VHS only
aka Man Hunter (US), Treasure of the White Goddess (US), Il Cacciatore di Uomini (It.); JE Films/Lisa Films, Italy/Spain/W. Germany, 1980; 86 min
Franco’s second contribution to the third-world cannibal
cycle, his first being Cannibals (1979),
is a project he inherited from his fellow countryman and Blind Dead
director Armando de Ossorio.
A minor entry, the plot details the
kidnapping of an actress on assignment in a South American jungle. Before
long the usual visceral horrors are taking place, with one twist: there’s
also a rampaging zombie on the loose. Zombie
Flesheaters’ Al Cliver (Pier Luigi Conti) leads the proceedings.
Interestingly, the film was produced
by Franco Prosperi, who along with Gualtiero Jacopetti was responsible
for creation of the shockumentary genre with his Mondo Cane (1961).
It was from interest in this cycle that the first third-world cannibal
films grew.
Dir. Clifford Brown (Jess Franco); Prod.
Franco Prosperi; Scr. Jess Franco; Star. Al Cliver (Pier
Luigi Conti), Ursula Fellner; With Burt Altman, Robert Foster, Gisela Han,
Werner Pochat.
UK Vid. VPD, QRT 80 min (unrated), Beta, VHS &
V2000
aka Chi Sei? (It.), Beyond the Door (US); Erre Cinematographia, Italy, 1974; 109 min
It’s often said that regardless of their commercial success,
the Japanese have little imagination of their own. Their real talent lies
in taking someone else’s idea — the cassette player, for example — and
refining it into something better, like the Sony Walkman. The Italian horror
cinema desperately tries to work on a similar principle, with some success,
but despite the best intentions of directors the results are often risible.
Enter The Devil Within Her, the first in the glut of mid-seventies
spaghetti possession pictures that followed The
Exorcist. Not to be confused with the 1975 Peter Sasdy film of
the same name, though also owing as much to Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
as to Friedkin’s film, this one stars Juliet Mills. Her portrayal of the
victim is a confused synthesis of the Mia Farrow/Linda Blair role, and
Richard Johnson joins her as the savant in an even more confused reworking
of the Sydney Balckmer role.
Opening with an attention-grabbing
voiceover, apparently by the Devil himself (Johnson), the film details
the demonic possesion of a middle-aged mother, pregnant after a brief affair
with a mysterious traveller called Dimitri (Johnson again). Dimitri re-enters
her life, revealed as a desperate man coming to the end of a Faust-style
pact with Satan. Cue the green vomit, head-swivelling and Mercedes McCambridge
impressions.
Despite the unimaginative plot, the film is quite enjoyable, mainly as
a result of seeing two actors who should know better — Mills and Johnson
— appearing in a genre with which they obviously have no affinity, and
yet appearing to take all the silliness very seriously indeed. Former matinee
idol Johnson, one time Bulldog Drummond and early contender for the role
of James Bond, is excellent in this regard. Those who remain unimpressed
should check him out as the whisky doctor star of Lucio Fulci’s Zombie
Flesheaters (1979). Also amusing are the many tongue-in-cheek nods
to The Exorcist, such as Mills’ unpossessed
though just as disrespectful pre-teen daughter who has a great line in
streetwise sassiness, and her cherubic young son who — in a pointed reference
to The Exorcist’s most famous scene
— spends most of the film swilling pea soup straight from the tin.
Riding the coat-tails of its progenitors,
The Devil Within Her was a hit in the USA where it was released,
amid a barrage of writs from Warner Bros. who sued for plagiarism, as Beyond
the Door. As a result of its success Mario Bava’s last feature, the
unrelated (and hugely superior) Shock (1977) was unforgivably retitled
Beyond the Door 2 for stateside distribution.
Dir. Sonia Assonitis, Roberto d’Ettore Piazzoli; Prod. Ovidio Assonitis, Giorgio Rossi; Scr. Sonia Assonitis, Roberto d’Ettore Piazzoli, Antonio Troisio, Giorgio Crudo; Star. Juliet Mills, Richard Johnson, Gabriele Lavia; With Joan Acti, David Cilin, Vittorio Fanfoni, Barbara Fiorini, Carla Mancini, Nino Segurini, Elisabeth Turner
UK Vid. Videospace, QRT. 94 min (unrated), Beta
& VHS; Apex, QRT. 94 min (BBFC: 18), VHS only
aka The Hollywood Strangler (US pre-r); Scorpion for Manson International, USA,
Drawing on the notorious case of the LA “hillside strangler”
(but changing its title in an attempt to be fashionable following titles
like Don’t Look In the Basement (1973),
Don’t Go in the Woods Alone (1980), Don’t
Go in the House (1980) and many others), Don’t Answer the Phone
is a particularly distasteful addition to the women-in-peril cycle.
A photographer, who is also a weighlifter
and Vietnam veteran (three factors which, according to the rules of the
genre, always seem to produce a sociopathic predisposition to murder) rapes
and kills five women before turning his attention to the pursuit of a female
radio phone-in psychiatrist.
The wild performance of Nick Worth
as the maniac aside, the film has little to recommend it.
Dir. Robert Hammer; Prod. Robert Hammer & Michael D. Castle; Scr. Robert Hammer & Michael D. Castle; Star. Nicholas Worth, Flo Gerrish; With Pamela Bryant, Ben Frank, Denise Galik, Gail Jensen, Dale Kalberg, Susanne Severeid, Paula Warner, James Westmoreland
UK Vid. World of V2000, QRT 90 min (unrated), Beta,
VHS & V2000
aka Don’t Go In the Woods (US & GB); USA, 1980; 88 min
Despite the dire warnings spelled out for them time and
time again in every one of these endless Friday the 13th clones,
the Stupid Young Americans essential to such films obviously needed further
advice on holiday safety. Thanks then, to the producers of this outing,
for helpfully providing it up-front in the title.
If you have any difficulty finding
this one, just check out any spam-in-a-cabin movie of the period — there
isn’t a single imaginative thought in the entire picture. As usual a group
of SYAs go camping only to have their holiday hijinks abruptly curtailed
by a machete-wielding maniac.
When will they ever learn?
Dir. Jim Bryan; With Mary Gail Artz, Ken Carter, James P. Hayden, Nick McClelland
UK Vid. Rank, QRT 88 min (unrated), Beta &
VHS
This enjoyably bad movie featuring flesh-eating vampires
prowling around LA is almost certainly the worst acted, worst directed
and worst edited film in the crypt. There is however an entirely gratuitous
shower scene featuring Linnea Quigley, so the film has at least something
to recommend it.
Quite how anyone could take it all
seriously is a mystery: nevertheless, the DPP and BBFC appear to have done
so.
Dir. Lawrence D. Foldes; Prod. Lawrence D. Foldes; Scr. Lawrence D. Foldes & Linwood Chase; Star. Aldo Ray, Tamara Taylor; With David Ariniello, Cambra Foldes, K.L. Garber, Janet Giglio, Steven Lovy, Lara Moran, Meeno Peluce, Crackers Phinn, Linnea Quigley, Chris Riley, Earl Statler, Doug White
UK Vid. Intervision/CBS, QRT 80 min, Beta &
VHS
Hallmark repeated their infamous "Keep repeating: It's
only a movie! It's only a movie!" campaign from Last
House on the Left to drum up some interest in this laughably shoddy
gore flick.
The director of a Florida asylum is
dispatched with an axe and one of the female inmates takes over. A bloodbath.
One twist: the only survivor is a black character (à la Night
of the Living Dead) called Sam with a fetish for lollies.
The best thing that can be said for
the picture is that there are worse ones. But not many.
Dir. S.F. Brownrigg; Prod. S.F.Brownrigg; Scr. Tim Pope; Star. William McGee, Annie MacAdams; With Camilla Carr, Jessica Lee Fulton, Rosie Holotik, Gene Ross.
UK Vid.Derann Film Services, QRT 95 min, Beta,
VHS & V2000
Navaron Films, USA, 1979; 85 m in
As the film which along with I Spit On Your Grave
(1980) was most often cited during the first wave of video nasty bashing,
Driller Killer surprises as an intelligent, well crafted and comparitively
restrained entry in the psycho-killer subgenre.
Described by author and critic Kim
Newman as “the only gore film genuinely to approach Art ... a feature which
plays like a punk Warhol Factory film”, Driller Killer stars
its director Abel Ferrara. Ferrara plays a struggling artist who ventures
out nightly to take an electric drill to the down-town drunks and derelicts
he forsees himself joining as a result of mounting financial and social
deprivation. The minimalist script carefully develops his descent into
madness as his girlfriend returns to her ex-husband, his agent rejects
his latest submission, and a loud rock group moves in next door. Eventually
the urge to kill totally overwhelms him and the unsympathetic agent becomes
another victim. The film ends unresolved with Ferrara, who has found the
home of his former girlfriend and murdered her ex-husband, taking his place
in her bed and awaiting her return.
Influenced no doubt by The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Ferrara
eschews graphic gore in favour of the power of suggestion. As a result
there is actually very little graphic bloodletting in the film and most
of the drill deaths take place out of shot. Also reminiscent of Chainsaw
is Ferrara’s evocation of the squalor of his protagonist’s existence, with
the sequences filmed in his apartment standing out as particularly well
handled.
Nevertheless, the film’s famous pre-Video
Recordings Act ban as obscene is not entirely unpredictable. While the
BBFC admits a three monkeys policy on the depiction of everyday tools as
murder weapons, the real reasons for Driller Killer’s removal had
more to do with that in-your-face title combined with a very distasteful
video display case. This was luridly captioned “The blood runs in rivers
as the drill keeps tearing through flesh and bone!” over a still of an
electric drill being forced into a screaming man’s forehead — ironically,
the only really graphic shot in the whole picture.
Dir. Abel Ferrara; Prod. Rochell Wiseberg; Scr. N G St John; Star. Jimmy Laine (Abel Ferrara), Carolyn Marz; With Baby Day, James O’ Hara, Maria Helhoski, Richard Howarth, Rodney Montreal, Harry Shultz, Alan Wynroth.
UK Vid. VIPCO, QRT 85 min (unrated), Beta &
VHS
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