There's a sticker on my computer monitor that reads "DIE YUPPY SCUM!!!". Though I spelled "yuppie" wrong, I stole my monitor from my place of business. It's a flat screen, 15" LCD monitor that's no thicker than a laptop. Why am I saying this? To relate to you just a few of the sins I commit unconsciously just by typing a review for The Devil's Nightmare: (1) My hatred for, and willingness to destroy, those of the yuppie persuasion and (2) my willing use of stolen (and far more costly than I'd actually spend the money for) goods for my own benefit. Hey, the way I see it, if a guy can steal bread for starving kids, why can't I steal a valuable, high-tech piece of computer equipment that the rest of my computer would be otherwise useless without? Don't judge me... I've got actual judges in black robes wielding gavels and state endowed legal magicks to do that to me all next week...

So, the point of our movie is sin and the penance we get stuck with for committing them. But, unlike I, who has yet to be punished for my thefts or yuppie slayings (provided I'm not suffering from Bateman-like hallucinations again), the good fodder of our movie aren't so lucky. It all begins back in 1945, in the good ol' days of war torn, Nazi controlled Germany, when colors weren't so vibrant and everything was apparently the hue of a faded burlap sack. A Berlin household plays stage to a series of bizarre events to unfold, as one of Hitler's generals sits by impatiently while his wife strains to pass a pineapple through a keyhole... and give birth too... While bombs fall all around them and random bits of drywall fall from the heavens, the wet nurse enters to give the general the old "good news and bad news" routine: the baby's out and healthy, but his wife died in the process... guess German birthing methods are a good century or so behind ours.

More concerned about the child's gender than the fact his woman's all corpsed up, General Gloomy-Gus kills the mood when he's told the child is a girl. Sending the nurse to a bomb shelter along with his appointed Nazi helper monkey Hans, the new father goes to check on his baby daughter... and stab her in the torso with a big fucking knife. Hey, he probably thought about what it's going to be like 15 years down the road trying to raise a teenage girl who grew up without a mother and realized it'd be much less painful for both of them this way... or at least for him. Of course there's more to this scene than a fat old guy not wanting to be a single parent a la half the sitcoms to come from the proverbial ass of television over the last decade, but that's exposition for a later time. From here we fast forward some 25 years to the very same general (who actually looks younger!), a.k.a. Baron Von Rhoneberg of the Rhoneberg Castle in, yep, the German countryside... albeit in a Belgian horror movie.

The now retired general is seen being interviewed by a female journalist who's very interested in the story of the supposed Von Rhoneberg curse that's plagued the man's family for centuries. But, when she asks if she can snap a few pics of his infamously cursed estate, the Baron refuses and demands she leave before there's trouble. Well, being a female journalist, you know she's gonna be taking those castle shots, but this should serve as a lesson to any would-be journalists watching: if someone tells you not to photograph their castle, DON'T, for the love of Peter Graves on a gas powered pogo stick, DO NOT take any fucking photographs of their stupid castle! Why?! The broad winds up with a spear in her front tire before being chased through the woods and winding up attacked, her body found later by local-yokels with "the mark of the Devil" on her body. Their humble opinions as pedestrians? She was scared to death... yeah, like in those "Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark" type books you read back in 5th grade... now that was some creepy shit on a dark night!... though not too dark to read obviously...

Not far away, a bus load of tourists traveling through the countryside realize their driver is a moron and they're lost. When they stop for directions, they find a fragile looking old man with one of the creepiest retirement home demeanors this side of Zelda Rubenstein. The fragile looking fop takes a moment out of his leaf burnings to point the posse to a castle on the other side of town where they can stay for the night before heading out on their tour again tomorrow morning. With a wave of his white gloved hands he sends the group on their way and before you can say "This looks like a job for the Scooby-Doo Detective Agency!", they're unpacking their shit and being roomed for till morning. In case you needed it spelled out for you, this very castle happens to be the Von Rhoneberg estate and these people are being set up like bowling pins. The big black ball hurtling toward them with homicidal urges? I'm gettin' to it...

While being shown their rooms by the evil butler henchman Hans, the former Nazi goon regales them with grizzly tales of the castle's past, including mysterious murders and exorcisms gone awry. The group is noticeably shaken by Hans's morbid Mother Goose stories, but hey, the place of over 5 centuries old, so ya gotta expect some blood to be spilled there sooner or later! Lighten up! On the plus side, it pays to be a man in a man's world as always, when two of our cast happen to be not only lesbians, but the super sexy swingin' type of lesbians exclusive to exploitation movies and White Zombie videos... ah, exploitation of the female form... man's one true best friend. And so, two hot broads in their underwear grope and paw and caress and kiss and bathe each other for our amusement before heading to dinner. While gorging themselves on free food, the Baron decides to lighten the mood with the story of how his family curse began. Seems that some 8 centuries or so ago, the Baron's ancestor made a pact with the goat-legged lord of the flies (and my bridge partner on Tuesday nights) for some demonic favors. As with any deal with Lucifer, there are always strings attached, and in this the string is actually a noose.

The fine print on this contract reads that the eldest female of each following generation would at one point become a succubus under Satan's service to be pimped out as he pleases for the purpose of seducing men (and women, heh heh) and gathering their souls for his eternal savings account... on which he gets 4% annual interest, as opposed to the 3.5% offered by Demons Federal Credit Union! Satan, always working to get you the most for your immortal soul! Sorry, we all gotta pay the bills, but enough commercials, we've got a movie to continue. So, anyway, the Von Rhoneberg ladies have all been streetwalkers for the Devil and many a lucky/unlucky man have been their commissions for over 800 years now. Sure enough, a gorgeous redhead in a skimpy, bust enhancing, cleavage thrusting, mid-drift baring outfit arrives on the castle's front step, much to the chagrin of the Baron's housekeeper. Though this babe, Lisa, seems incredibly suspicious and is obviously a succubus of Mephistopheles, neither the Baron nor Hans seem to recognize her from anywhere other than their wet midnight old man emissions, so either they're playing dumb or they really don't realize she's apparently a member of the clan... though obviously not the Baron's daughter, as he killed her in the cradle... didn't he?...

Amidst our colorful group of out-of-towners (who all seem to want to carry lit candlesticks in the well lit castle), we've got the two lesbians, a rich snob and her boy toy purse leach, a crabby old guy, the bus driver and a priest-in-training by the name of Alvin Sorell, who takes prominence over the rest of the group in that I actually made sure to pick up his name. As you can imagine, Lisa starts living up to her role as a succubus, seducing the members of the group with some of the 7 deadly sins, greed, lust, gluttony, uhm... chasing after suspicious women... okay, so only a couple of the deadly mortal sins are used, but all that matters is that Lisa starts taking these goons out. The first to go is the tour guide, who's seduced to eat in excess of a banquet set before him by the red-haired siren until he's spewing green vomit and choking to death. Remember girls, the way to a man's immortal soul isn't through his pants, it's through his stomach.

The next is the money grubbing old bag, whose interests in the Baron's alchemaic practices get her oblivion at the beck of a pile of very hungry gold painted quicksand. Yep, swallowed by goldust, the ironic end for the greedy. Other fatalities go on to include the purse leach and one of the sluts (who's obviously not wholly on the lesbian side of the fence), caught in the middle of a midnight tryst and fed to a guillotine and iron maiden (complete with iron boobs!) respectively in the Baron's beloved torture attic. The crotchety old man finally meets his end when his curiosity gets the best of him and he finds himself chasing down the despondent Lisa through the castle's halls one minute, then finds himself impaled on a row of steel fencing rods the next, tossed from 3 stories up by the arcane enchantress who, understandably, doesn't enjoy being chased by nosy old codgers. The blond lesbo gets felt up by a python before waking up to it and, uhm, I guess she croaks from fear like that journalist broad did earlier... yeah, that's it...

In addition to all this corruption and killing, Lisa's also been trying to work her feminine wiles on Charlie Church and get under that paper collar of his. Stripteases and dirty talk don't seem to get through though, and at one point she lets her illusion of gorgeous physical beauty slip, giving Alvin a quick glance and a shot in the ass of reality: Lisa is indeed a succubus. It's amazing how much different a woman looks without makeup... Her identity revealed now, Lisa cans the seduction crap and decides to attack Mr. Sorell outright, only to get bitch slapped by his crucifix, which leaves a substantial gouge over her forehead considering Jesus's non-violent choice of lifestyle! This minor injury leaves the raging hellbeast a whimpering, quivering mass of pussy, so Satan has to show up and finish the job. When Alvin finds refuge within the walls of a church that happens to border the Von Rhoneberg property line (wow, that was convenient), the old king of lies works his mojo and tries to seduce Alvin where a drop dead redhead in tight revealing outfits failed... maybe if he took the guise of a preteen boy rather than a crusty old goblin of a man, he'd have something...

The Devil's sweet talk doesn't work, but Alvin offers up his blind obedience anyway, in trade for the return of the six souls Beelzebub already swiped from his sinful travel companions. Satan's not all that interested at first, until Alvin makes him realize a little something: by taking Alvin now, this will prevent him from becoming an official man of the cloth and prevent him from saving all those potential sinners he'll encounter later in life. That's the way I always figured it should've been done: kill 'em off early enough that they can't grow to be any real menace. Should've done it with that hippy Jesus clod back in Nazareth and look what happened there... one regret I relive every morning of my afterlife... After signing away his immortal existence to an eternity of red hot pokers in his ass and gremlins nippin' at his nutsac, Alvin awakens the following morn to find everything on the level and the world's back to normal... hold on to your midgets in drag though kiddies, cuz this is NOT about to become one of those "it was all a dream" cheap-o finales...

During his morning fencing session, the Baron's distracted momentarily and takes a sword tip to the heart, mortally wounding him. While fading away like so many miserable new wave bands from the '80s, the Baron confesses to the young priest-to-be that he's guilty of breaking the whole "thou shalt not bare false witness" commandment, having lied to the group earlier about never having kids of his own. We of the audience all know that's a sack o' crap, cuz we watched him shish-ka-bob his baby daughter in the opening sequence. Of course, since his daughter never lived to adulthood, that only reaffirms Alvin's theory that the previous night and all of that succubus stuff was a bad dream and Lisa's just a normal, traveling trollop. This false security is soon shattered and our story given a whole new dimension when the housekeeper reveals to our hero that she had a bastard child with the Baron's brother... that child was Lisa... the female Von Rhoneberg... who grew up to be a succubus of the Devil's stable... Alvin, kiss your fellow chipmunks goodbye, cuz that's the sound of your immortal soul gettin screwed something wicked by God's redheaded step-child.

Sorell stays behind at the castle, prepared to spend the rest of his life and Lisa's plaything until Satan's ready to claim him. The rest of the tour group go on their way, none the wisers of the horrible fates they've just been spared, nor of the price their bible thumping buddy has paid to prevent them. Then, for that last little twist of the irony knife into Alvin's spine, while he and Lisa watch the bus drive away toward it's destiny, the fried chicken devouring man pig of a driver suddenly dumps it into a ravine in an effort to avoid a funeral carriage blocking the road... of course driven by the fragile little geezer known as Satan. Yes kiddies, a classic stuffing of irony in your cakehole as Alvin's given up his soul for nothing when the souls he fought to save so unselfishly, and sacrificed his own forever damnation for, just end up skinny-dipping in the lakes of fire anyway. Ah Lucifer, always the prick in the end. He was like that all the time back in our college days... probably why he wound up failing philosophy class and dropped out to start Starbucks™...

All in all, I have to admit that The Devil's Nightmare turned out a lot better than I had predicted. Whereas I was expecting your typical brainless exploitation sleaze-o-rama festivale of tits and ass and lesbian orgies with little-to-no story and the SAG equivalent of stray cats howling in agony in the back room of a Chinese restaurant, I was instead treated to a better than average penance flick complete with The City Of Lost Children's Daniel "Krank" Emilfork as the Prince of Darkness! It's nothing spectacular, but you can't lose either way! Mediocre, but at least mediocre is better than cheap crap. Two problems as far as the story goes weren't really in the plot or characters themselves, just with Lisa's claim that she killed each of her victims in an act of mortal sin so as to damn them to Hell when they died. The act itself makes sense, but my problem is with two of her victims: the old guy and the blond lesbo. The old guy was killed after following Lisa through the castle's cold halls and the blond dies suddenly when she wakes up to find a snake in her sheets. So, what exactly were these sins they were in the process of committing? Are the 8th and 9th less talked about sins the sins of curiosity and sleeping scantily clad?!