Showing posts with label Burning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Burning. Show all posts
30 Jun 2012
Night of the Demon - Lisa's Review
*** SPOILERS ***
Well we've got a right stinker this week. I wouldn't say it was the worst one I've watched so far on the list, but it is definately not one I would ever recommend to anyone else for any reason, other than a desire to complete the nasties list challenge.
Our basic storyline here centres around a very nasty Bigfoot who lives in a forest and likes to go around killing people in various entertaining ways. Of course there is a willing group of cannon fodder for our monster courtesy of a group of college students (yup... yet again) and their professor who are investigating the truth behind the legend of this particular monster (or Demon if you will).
The movie actually starts by telling you how its going to end. The professor is in hospital, all bandaged up. The only survivor of a Bigfoot massacre. The movie is told through a series of flashbacks, which like another movie we watched recently also made no sense as the person telling the story was not present at all the flashbacks! Irritating! Contingency issues is the least of our worries here though.
Where do I start? The acting in this movie is terrible. The script is laughable to the extreme, but not in a funny way, more in a 'I can't believe I'm watching this shit' way. The story is oh so predictable but is full of holes.
One thing which really irritated me about the movie is the way some of the deaths or reactions to them are drawn out. They in no way change or add anything. The camera just stays there filming the same scene for aaaaaaaaaaaages. I could just feel the actor hung upside down with blood dripping down his face, into his eyes and mouth thinking... 'Come on already!!!' Also there is nothing more irritating than a screaming woman in a horror... jeeeeeeeeez you have your fair share of this here. I refer to the first death scene which happens to a courting couple who are making love in a car. The bloke is dragged out and onto the top of the car and murdered out of sight. His bloody body however falls down onto the windscreen and slithers downwards (as they always do when a windscreen is involved). The womans reaction was downright ridiculous! How many ways did the director ask her to react? Its like her said, 'No, try that again', she did about 20 attempts and they kept them all in!! This is all while she is completely starkers by the way. She does pick up something to cover herself with and decides to cover her waist with it....
The gore is ok in places, but it would have been very easy to improve the effects with a little more effort. Gore includes an impaling on a tree, a ripped off penis when a motorcyclist stops to relieve himself, a throat slitting on a window pane, an impaling on a pitchfork, a disembowlment (this was probably the best one as he proceeds to whip the poor guys innards around the room) and the birth of a half human / half Bigfoot.
So where does the baby come from? Well our students hear a story that a young woman called Wanda (who has a reputation for being crazy) has had an encounter of the very close kind with Bigfoot where he impregnates her. Her father (a preacher) witnesses the rape and waits until his daughter gives birth so he can kill the offspring which he believes to be evil. He's an odd sort, her dad.
Wanda then undergoes a ritualistic reliving of her rape every year by her fathers followers who believe the ritual somehow protects them. Is it any wonder the girl is a little disturbed?
Our ever understanding students blunder into her home and basically force all this information out of her by way of hypnotism. When the beans have been spilled, predictably Bigfoot makes an appearance and does away with the cast (I felt a cheer coming on.. GO BIGFOOT!).
Sadly our professor lives to tell the tale in a hospital and we are subjected to this movie. As always with this kind of experience, everything is put down to 'madness'.
Conclusion? This is bloody awful. Avoid.
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the main post for this movie.
10 Mar 2012
The Gestapo's last orgy - Lisa's Review
This movie contained 1 of only 2 subjects I find deeply uncomfortable, that of sexual abuse (if any regular readers exist, they will know the other subject is animal cruelty/torture/death).
While The Beast in Heat was too ridiculous and camp to find offensive, this one definately has an altogether different feel. The abuse is cruel, violent, humiliating and degrading and it was something I found hard to watch. I didn't find the rest of the movie was handled in a serious enough light given these kind of scenes.
Something I found even more repugnant was the leading lady (yet another Lisa.. what is it with nasties and Lisa's) and her switch from refusal to give in to the Nazi's and wanting to die, to her falling in love with the lead Nazi, even simulating giving a gun he points at her a blow job. It kind of cheapens what the POWs are going through and to me, the 2 completely contrary viewpoints didn't gel in a movie that was in any way poignant. Sure I've heard of Stockholm Syndrome and they may have been angling that sort of direction, but for me, it wasn't an intelligent enough movie to carry this off with any sort of conviction.
I won't waste my own time or any other readers time going into any significant detail about the movie other than to say if you enjoy crap movies with bad acting, a weak plot, a laughable script and delight in seeing women degraded and abused for sexual kicks, then you may enjoy this. I for one wouldn't recommend it.
A mention must go however to the cute gerbils masquerading as rats. I did enjoy them.
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the main post for this movie.
4 Dec 2011
Don't go into the woods - Lisa's Review
So here I sit on a Sunday morning before leaving for work getting last weeks 'nasty' fitted into my schedule and what monumental waste of time. Even reviewing it seems like minutes lost that will never be recaptured. I'm trying in vain to think of something positive to say about this movie, but the only teeny tiny positives are in fact accidental on the part of the film makers.
Firstly, I thought as with a lot of these movies, it may be foreign and had the actors voices dubbed on in english at a later date, but nooooooooo. This leaves me kind of inredulous as to how on earth the worst 'after dubbing' effect was achieved by this movie. I have seen and heard better acting at a school play. Every word is in slow motion, dragged and spaced out as if trying to fit in with the mouth movements rather than sound believable. How this has happened given the movie is anyones guess.
To be very politically incorrect for a moment, the lead characters (4 of them, 2 girls and 2 guys) is almost like a group of special needs kids out for a jolly in the woods. It took me some time to actually accept none of them were meant to be retarded.
We interrupt this review for competition news: the third word you will need to enter to win a copy of "Don't Look in the Basement" is "BEING". and now, back to the review...
The plotline... very loosely speaking, is several groups of people in the woods.. twitchers, swingers, hikers etc all being killed by an off screen assailant, who is later revealed and just looks like another retarded grizzly adams. The kills are all pretty standard, nothing new... impaling, stabbing, slashing, amputation, beating to death in a sleeping bag, burning in a van. There is absolutely no suspense at all and rather than care about the characters so you actually look forward to a death for something to happen and then are generally left disappointed by how crap it was. Another point about the actual kills... the screaming never changes while any character is being killed, its the same volume and pitch all the way through. I never thought a woman burning in a van would scream loudly at exactly the same pitch and then just stop.
Another point, was why they kept repeating parts of the script over' and over again... 'no, no, no, no, no', 'give me key, give me the keys, give me the keys', 'we got to keep moving, we got to keep moving, we got to keep moving'... you get the message.
The men are f*ckwits, the women are stupid (whats new there about an 80's horror) and I just couldn't wait to get to the end. It was almost like this movie was filmed as a comedy, but sadly it doesn't even have that excuse. There were a few unintentional mildly amusing bits but my lurgy is getting in the way of my sense of humour this morning so they just irritated me in their crapness.
There is no reason to watch this movie, other than to see possibly the worst acting and witness the worst script I have ever seen/heard. AVOID at all costs would be my advice!
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the main post for this movie.
Firstly, I thought as with a lot of these movies, it may be foreign and had the actors voices dubbed on in english at a later date, but nooooooooo. This leaves me kind of inredulous as to how on earth the worst 'after dubbing' effect was achieved by this movie. I have seen and heard better acting at a school play. Every word is in slow motion, dragged and spaced out as if trying to fit in with the mouth movements rather than sound believable. How this has happened given the movie is anyones guess.
To be very politically incorrect for a moment, the lead characters (4 of them, 2 girls and 2 guys) is almost like a group of special needs kids out for a jolly in the woods. It took me some time to actually accept none of them were meant to be retarded.
We interrupt this review for competition news: the third word you will need to enter to win a copy of "Don't Look in the Basement" is "BEING". and now, back to the review...
The plotline... very loosely speaking, is several groups of people in the woods.. twitchers, swingers, hikers etc all being killed by an off screen assailant, who is later revealed and just looks like another retarded grizzly adams. The kills are all pretty standard, nothing new... impaling, stabbing, slashing, amputation, beating to death in a sleeping bag, burning in a van. There is absolutely no suspense at all and rather than care about the characters so you actually look forward to a death for something to happen and then are generally left disappointed by how crap it was. Another point about the actual kills... the screaming never changes while any character is being killed, its the same volume and pitch all the way through. I never thought a woman burning in a van would scream loudly at exactly the same pitch and then just stop.
Another point, was why they kept repeating parts of the script over' and over again... 'no, no, no, no, no', 'give me key, give me the keys, give me the keys', 'we got to keep moving, we got to keep moving, we got to keep moving'... you get the message.
The men are f*ckwits, the women are stupid (whats new there about an 80's horror) and I just couldn't wait to get to the end. It was almost like this movie was filmed as a comedy, but sadly it doesn't even have that excuse. There were a few unintentional mildly amusing bits but my lurgy is getting in the way of my sense of humour this morning so they just irritated me in their crapness.
There is no reason to watch this movie, other than to see possibly the worst acting and witness the worst script I have ever seen/heard. AVOID at all costs would be my advice!
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the main post for this movie.
26 Nov 2011
Don't Go In The House - Will's review.
This weeks movie had shades of Psycho, with a central character who was haunted by his preserved mother, and lures young women to his home to kill them.
Unlike psycho, his "mother" doesn't actually seem to be directly related to the murders - she doesn't tell him to commit them; she just generally bothers him while he goes around collecting bodies.
The only way Donny's mother is connected to his crimes, is that her abuse made him the man he is today; she used to burn his arms with fire to 'purify' him, which has left him with more than a small fire obsession (he even works at a rubbish incinerator).
When Donny finds his mother dead, he at first does all the things that every 30's something wishes he could; he plays his music loud, jumps on the furniture, and builds himself a metal-lined death room where he can burn people to death with a flame flower 'borrowed' from work. He even gets himself an appropriate wardrobe from his neighbourhood camping supplies, hunting, fishing, and fire-suite store.
His lure and kill cycle is fairly repetitive, and the film makers had the good sense not to show it more that once, instead just showing us part of subsequent captures.
That said, the burning effect was well done, and another couple of those might have made a bette filler than a 10 minute scene where Donny buys some clothes to go out in!
Slow 3rd act and some truly awful acting aside, it's a solid enough film (at least by the standard so far) with reasonable corpse and fire effects (some practical, some superimposed).
Body Count: 5
Animal Body Count: 0
Boob Count: 1 pair
Most memorable death: Burning in bondage (the first one)
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the main post for this movie.
30 Jul 2011
The Burning - Will's Review
SPOILER FREE FOR FIRST FEW PARAGRAPHS (THERE WILL BE FURTHER WARNING BEFORE SPOILERS BEGIN)
Wow, I'm pleased to announce that I actually enjoyed this weeks movie! Don't get me wrong we're not talking "Oscar for best picture" (or for anything else for that matter) but it was a good, solid 80's slasher movie; if you like 80's slashers, and haven't seen "The Burning", stop reading at the next spoiler warning, and go see it. If you don't like 80's Slashers, I'm really not sure what you're doing here - but please don't go, we love both of our readers!
Seeing names like "Mirimax" and "Weinstein" in the opening credits was a bit surreal, and served as a reminder that the "Video Nasty" phenomenon was not something limited to independent movies and obscure dubbed foreign movies - Here is a "proper" Hollywood movie, that was actually prosecuted, in Britain, in living memory, for being 'Obscene'!
Speaking of the credits, I'll admit my hopes were raised when "Makeup effects by Tom Savini" flashed up; and he didn't disappoint (then, he never does).
If you've been following these 'reviews' (so, me and Lisa then...) you have probably noticed that I'm a Friday the 13th fan, and there's plenty here to remind you of these movies; enough that if it had gone wrong it would have been really annoying, but try to bear in mind that The Burning, at first glance, seems to owe much to FT13 2&3; but bear in mind that this was released in 1981, the same year as FT13pII, so they would have been in production at the same time.
At a summer camp (with a lake, no less) someone is involved, through the carelessness of others, in an accident that, by rights, should have killed him; 5 years later he shows up at a camp across the lake and starts picking off teenagers.
See? A few years later you would swear this was a Jason rippoff!
SPOILERS COMMENCE HERE
The difference in killer origin between here and FT13 is quite pronounced - for one thing, we at home are never lead to believe that Cropsy is dead - we see him in hospital (where tactless doctors gross each other out with him) and we're with him when he stops to pick up a hooker upon his release (Who makes the mistake of being openly horrified by scarred face, and is introduced to the pointy end of a pair of scissors for her poor etiquette). For another thing, his non-death (by burning, obviously) is the result of a prank-gone-wrong, rather than a pure accident.
The pacing was pretty good - in the films first 50 minutes the aforementioned hooker is the only kill - this gives us plenty of time to build suspense and learn who's who in our troupe of camping stereotypes, and means that when the kills do start coming, they come thick and fast - the best scene in the movie was the frantic 5 kill raft rampage, which would have been awesome on it's own merits, but is made more so by it's position in the film; we know that there has been a kill already (our campers don't) so when the 5-man raft finds one of the missing canoes they have been sent to look for I was utterly convinced they would find a body in it - instead Cropsy jumps out with his trusty shears and proceeds to off the entire population of the raft in about 60 seconds!
On the other hand, we are 'treated' to the most awkward and (thankfully - for us, not for the girl) brief, teen-sex scene ever. There's also a scene where a guy practically forces himself on a girl; he stops last minute, but not before he's earned (in horror movie terms at least) a death that's too long coming - in fact, the girl meets Cropsy's shears before he dose - fuck you movie!
I would love to have seen a sequel (as, it seems, would others - "the burning 2" is a suggested search on Google as soon as you type in "the burning") but, due mostly to shonky marketing, Cropsy cost twice as much to unleash on the public as the public paid to see him, and so the film was a monumental flop that may well have been forgotten but for the fact that the uncut version was accidentally released on VHS, and so it made the DPP list.
Body Count: 10
Animal Body Count: 0
Boob Count: 2 pairs
Most Memorable Kill: The 5-kid raft slaughter (if I had to pick just one I'd go with the extreme manicure...)
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the "Reader Reviews" post for this movie.
Wow, I'm pleased to announce that I actually enjoyed this weeks movie! Don't get me wrong we're not talking "Oscar for best picture" (or for anything else for that matter) but it was a good, solid 80's slasher movie; if you like 80's slashers, and haven't seen "The Burning", stop reading at the next spoiler warning, and go see it. If you don't like 80's Slashers, I'm really not sure what you're doing here - but please don't go, we love both of our readers!
Seeing names like "Mirimax" and "Weinstein" in the opening credits was a bit surreal, and served as a reminder that the "Video Nasty" phenomenon was not something limited to independent movies and obscure dubbed foreign movies - Here is a "proper" Hollywood movie, that was actually prosecuted, in Britain, in living memory, for being 'Obscene'!
Speaking of the credits, I'll admit my hopes were raised when "Makeup effects by Tom Savini" flashed up; and he didn't disappoint (then, he never does).
If you've been following these 'reviews' (so, me and Lisa then...) you have probably noticed that I'm a Friday the 13th fan, and there's plenty here to remind you of these movies; enough that if it had gone wrong it would have been really annoying, but try to bear in mind that The Burning, at first glance, seems to owe much to FT13 2&3; but bear in mind that this was released in 1981, the same year as FT13pII, so they would have been in production at the same time.
At a summer camp (with a lake, no less) someone is involved, through the carelessness of others, in an accident that, by rights, should have killed him; 5 years later he shows up at a camp across the lake and starts picking off teenagers.
See? A few years later you would swear this was a Jason rippoff!
SPOILERS COMMENCE HERE
The difference in killer origin between here and FT13 is quite pronounced - for one thing, we at home are never lead to believe that Cropsy is dead - we see him in hospital (where tactless doctors gross each other out with him) and we're with him when he stops to pick up a hooker upon his release (Who makes the mistake of being openly horrified by scarred face, and is introduced to the pointy end of a pair of scissors for her poor etiquette). For another thing, his non-death (by burning, obviously) is the result of a prank-gone-wrong, rather than a pure accident.
The pacing was pretty good - in the films first 50 minutes the aforementioned hooker is the only kill - this gives us plenty of time to build suspense and learn who's who in our troupe of camping stereotypes, and means that when the kills do start coming, they come thick and fast - the best scene in the movie was the frantic 5 kill raft rampage, which would have been awesome on it's own merits, but is made more so by it's position in the film; we know that there has been a kill already (our campers don't) so when the 5-man raft finds one of the missing canoes they have been sent to look for I was utterly convinced they would find a body in it - instead Cropsy jumps out with his trusty shears and proceeds to off the entire population of the raft in about 60 seconds!
On the other hand, we are 'treated' to the most awkward and (thankfully - for us, not for the girl) brief, teen-sex scene ever. There's also a scene where a guy practically forces himself on a girl; he stops last minute, but not before he's earned (in horror movie terms at least) a death that's too long coming - in fact, the girl meets Cropsy's shears before he dose - fuck you movie!
I would love to have seen a sequel (as, it seems, would others - "the burning 2" is a suggested search on Google as soon as you type in "the burning") but, due mostly to shonky marketing, Cropsy cost twice as much to unleash on the public as the public paid to see him, and so the film was a monumental flop that may well have been forgotten but for the fact that the uncut version was accidentally released on VHS, and so it made the DPP list.
Body Count: 10
Animal Body Count: 0
Boob Count: 2 pairs
Most Memorable Kill: The 5-kid raft slaughter (if I had to pick just one I'd go with the extreme manicure...)
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the "Reader Reviews" post for this movie.
16 Jul 2011
Bloody Moon - Will's Review
Not great, but for all it's (many, many) flaws I found myself quite enjoying it. I Don't know if I was just in a receptive mood, or if last weeks monstrosity has lowered my expectations (or dulled my senses) enough to cope with anything, but I found myself ignoring certain aspects of this one and enjoy the ride.
The opening sequence is a Masked ball / 80's pool-side party, complete with a scarred pervert in the hedges (I say "scarred" he actually has a pot of silly putty blobbed all over one side of his face) watching people "make out". But he really hits the jackpot when the group stud engages in the most mutually verbally guided sex ever ("kiss me harder", "touch me there" etc.), not because he gets to watch, but because said man-bike is ordered to take his mask off (Mickey Mouse - Disney must love this!) allowing putty-features to pose as him.
Now, you may think I'm beings bit harsh calling him a man-bike for sleeping with one girl, but when or disfigured perve wanders into the party and immediately starts dancing with a girl, her reaction is basically "Oh, I though you were with [another girl], great - want to come back to my place?", he does and she fails to notice how silent he's being, on account that she's happy to have both sides of the conversation "I want you, and You want me too don't you, yes you do, I could tell", they're just about to bump uglies, when she knocks his mask off, and sees that it's not the guy she was after - oddly (!) she objects to this, and her screams are rewarded with a pair of scissors to the gut - repeatedly and unconvincingly.
Cut to 5 years later, and Scar-face's sister has come to pick him up from the asylum, the possibility of him having another 'Episode' is deemed unlikely, but she is told, never the less, to avoid upsetting situations, and in particular to 'never mention that night'.
So, attempted rape and a murder is 'an episode' now...
At one point, Manuela is pottering around her room in the mansion in a see-through nightie when there is a knock at the door; it's her brother. At this point, I have written in my notes "He seems very relaxed chatting to his sister while her boobs are vis.... Ohhhh, Ewwwwww" As at this point, they start making out, while Miguel begs her to "love him again like [she] did before"... It is truly the most desturbing consentual (thankfully not quite) sex scene I have ever seen! Thankfully, she calls it off befor things get, well even worse, Remiding him that it would be wrong as people would judge them, she (rather stupidly) says to him that they could be together if they "Could just get rid of everyone arround [them]" doubletripplecringe!
Later, at the Campus "Disco Club", Antonio, dispite having every interchangeable blond in the place virtually begging him for sex, decides to walk Angela home. Literally walk her home. He doesn't even ask to come in!
Some time later, the killer stalks Angela in her room - and he has mad vanishing skills! I know ALL slasher villains have super stealth, but check this guy out:
Actually, I'm glad that clip contained musak - I'm quite certain the score on this one will have driven Lisa nuts, containing as it does 2 themes; There's the one from the trailer (which is usally source music - playing over the radio, on whatever) and the one in the clip above, which for some reason puts me in mind of a bad cover of G'n'R's version of "Live and Let Die".
Anyway, the knock at the door is one of the interchangeables, who comes over to borrow a sweater from Angela, but instead gets stabbed (from behind) through the tit - ouch! unfortunately for Angela, the body vanishes before she has time to tell anyone, and general consensus is that she imagined the whole thing.
Angela (perhaps understandably) does start to loose it at this point; she imagines that the language lab (remember those?) in her class is threatening her.
Later, she goes for a walk down by the harbour to look for her murdered friend (The harbour is stunning by the way) where she sees Manuela hasteling Antonio, and then nearly gets crushed by a falling rock - which she thinks is a matter for the police...
I'd verb her nouns out!
And so it continues, there a a couple more (fake looking) murders (including an "I'll be right back"), more scenes of Manuela wheeling around her (unmoving) aunt, Shots of Bueno being creepy and retarded, and a fun aside where Antonio "saves" Angela by cutting a Snake with some shears, but all she knows is that she turns around to see him holding up the bloody shears at her.
Human Body Count: 7
Animal Body Count: 1
Boobs: 6 pairs
Most memorable death: Stabbed trough the boob.
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the "Reader Reviews" post for this movie.
The opening sequence is a Masked ball / 80's pool-side party, complete with a scarred pervert in the hedges (I say "scarred" he actually has a pot of silly putty blobbed all over one side of his face) watching people "make out". But he really hits the jackpot when the group stud engages in the most mutually verbally guided sex ever ("kiss me harder", "touch me there" etc.), not because he gets to watch, but because said man-bike is ordered to take his mask off (Mickey Mouse - Disney must love this!) allowing putty-features to pose as him.
Now, you may think I'm beings bit harsh calling him a man-bike for sleeping with one girl, but when or disfigured perve wanders into the party and immediately starts dancing with a girl, her reaction is basically "Oh, I though you were with [another girl], great - want to come back to my place?", he does and she fails to notice how silent he's being, on account that she's happy to have both sides of the conversation "I want you, and You want me too don't you, yes you do, I could tell", they're just about to bump uglies, when she knocks his mask off, and sees that it's not the guy she was after - oddly (!) she objects to this, and her screams are rewarded with a pair of scissors to the gut - repeatedly and unconvincingly.
Cut to 5 years later, and Scar-face's sister has come to pick him up from the asylum, the possibility of him having another 'Episode' is deemed unlikely, but she is told, never the less, to avoid upsetting situations, and in particular to 'never mention that night'.
So, attempted rape and a murder is 'an episode' now...
Anyway, on the way home on the train putty-features becomes slightly obsessed with some poor girl (hilariously, when the girl screams, blobby-chops' sisters' first question is "you didn't kill her did you?"
Over the next few scenes we are introduced to our (fairly sizeable) cast, all of whom either attend, run or own the 'International Youth-Club Boarding School of Langueges', which has newly opened in the privately owned complex of bungalows which houses the pool from the opening party. Our cast of characters consists of
Which brings us to the first major plot-problem... The movie tries hard to keep us guessing not only who the killer is, but why, and who is 'in on it', but for the entire rest of the movie we will frequently see Manuella pushing her Aunt around in her wheelchair (always with her back to camera), and generally acting as though she is still alive (although she never speaks), so guessing her involvement is not the most challenging task...
We are told that Angela is staying in Bungalow 13, which has a bit of a reputation amongst the girls as it is the bungalow in which a girl was stabbed to death with scissors 5 years ago (that the murder was committed by the landowner's nephew apparently isn't known to them). Brilliantly / Awfully, although it is never mentioned on screen, Bungalow 13 still has the same furniture now, as a boarding room in a school, as it had then, as a private residence and murder-scene.
Angela has a bit of a rought time of it on her first day in the bungellow - first she catches Bueno perving through her window, then she (imagines she?) catches sight of Miguel in her mirror, then a looming figure approaches her door - luckily this traumatic time is brought to an when the figure turns out to be an underage door-to-door ceramic elephant seller... No, Really!
Over the next few scenes we are introduced to our (fairly sizeable) cast, all of whom either attend, run or own the 'International Youth-Club Boarding School of Langueges', which has newly opened in the privately owned complex of bungalows which houses the pool from the opening party. Our cast of characters consists of
- Miguel - The Aforementioned scared murderer / attempted rapist
- Manuela - Miguel's Sister
- Angela - Our obvious "Final Girl", remember the girl from the train? This is her, she also just happens to be attending the language school!
- Countess Maria - Wheelchair bound Aunt of Miguel and Manuela - she owns the entire bungalow complex and the mansion above it, and is vocal in her dislike of Manuela and her intention to leave everything to her nephew.
- Alvaro - Who, With Manuela, runs the school
- Antonio - School janitor and groundskeepers, known for being a hit in the sack, and not afraid to offer his services as a willing piece of meat. Make the Man-Bike from the pool party look like a modest prude.
- Bueno - Slightly retarded, bald grounds-staff member at the school
- Eva / Rita / Inga / probably more - Interchangeable blonde students of the school, nubile cannon fodder.
Which brings us to the first major plot-problem... The movie tries hard to keep us guessing not only who the killer is, but why, and who is 'in on it', but for the entire rest of the movie we will frequently see Manuella pushing her Aunt around in her wheelchair (always with her back to camera), and generally acting as though she is still alive (although she never speaks), so guessing her involvement is not the most challenging task...
We are told that Angela is staying in Bungalow 13, which has a bit of a reputation amongst the girls as it is the bungalow in which a girl was stabbed to death with scissors 5 years ago (that the murder was committed by the landowner's nephew apparently isn't known to them). Brilliantly / Awfully, although it is never mentioned on screen, Bungalow 13 still has the same furniture now, as a boarding room in a school, as it had then, as a private residence and murder-scene.
Angela has a bit of a rought time of it on her first day in the bungellow - first she catches Bueno perving through her window, then she (imagines she?) catches sight of Miguel in her mirror, then a looming figure approaches her door - luckily this traumatic time is brought to an when the figure turns out to be an underage door-to-door ceramic elephant seller... No, Really!
Would I lie to you?
At one point, Manuela is pottering around her room in the mansion in a see-through nightie when there is a knock at the door; it's her brother. At this point, I have written in my notes "He seems very relaxed chatting to his sister while her boobs are vis.... Ohhhh, Ewwwwww" As at this point, they start making out, while Miguel begs her to "love him again like [she] did before"... It is truly the most desturbing consentual (thankfully not quite) sex scene I have ever seen! Thankfully, she calls it off befor things get, well even worse, Remiding him that it would be wrong as people would judge them, she (rather stupidly) says to him that they could be together if they "Could just get rid of everyone arround [them]" doubletripplecringe!
Later, at the Campus "Disco Club", Antonio, dispite having every interchangeable blond in the place virtually begging him for sex, decides to walk Angela home. Literally walk her home. He doesn't even ask to come in!
Some time later, the killer stalks Angela in her room - and he has mad vanishing skills! I know ALL slasher villains have super stealth, but check this guy out:
Actually, I'm glad that clip contained musak - I'm quite certain the score on this one will have driven Lisa nuts, containing as it does 2 themes; There's the one from the trailer (which is usally source music - playing over the radio, on whatever) and the one in the clip above, which for some reason puts me in mind of a bad cover of G'n'R's version of "Live and Let Die".
Anyway, the knock at the door is one of the interchangeables, who comes over to borrow a sweater from Angela, but instead gets stabbed (from behind) through the tit - ouch! unfortunately for Angela, the body vanishes before she has time to tell anyone, and general consensus is that she imagined the whole thing.
Angela (perhaps understandably) does start to loose it at this point; she imagines that the language lab (remember those?) in her class is threatening her.
Later, she goes for a walk down by the harbour to look for her murdered friend (The harbour is stunning by the way) where she sees Manuela hasteling Antonio, and then nearly gets crushed by a falling rock - which she thinks is a matter for the police...
And so it continues, there a a couple more (fake looking) murders (including an "I'll be right back"), more scenes of Manuela wheeling around her (unmoving) aunt, Shots of Bueno being creepy and retarded, and a fun aside where Antonio "saves" Angela by cutting a Snake with some shears, but all she knows is that she turns around to see him holding up the bloody shears at her.
Eventually, 3 of the bodies turn up in Angela's bungalow, She is confronted by the masked killer, and rescued by Miguel, leaving the 2 to fight, she runs to the mansion where she is drugged, and the plot revealed.
In true slasher fashion, everyone present (but final girl) gets killed, just in time for the police to arrive.
As I saw, I quite enjoyed it, but now I come to describe the film, I can't for the life of me see why...
But there's enough potential here IMO to warrant a remake (I never got the point of remaking films which ether never had anything going for them - "Prom Night", or were already pretty much perfect "Nightmare on Elm Street" - lets remake the films with wasted potential!) - a bit more back story about what caused Miguel's "episode" in the first place could set him up as a much more sympathetic character (while at the same time developing the sister) and not actually showing us the Aunt's murder would help the mystery along no-end.
But there's enough potential here IMO to warrant a remake (I never got the point of remaking films which ether never had anything going for them - "Prom Night", or were already pretty much perfect "Nightmare on Elm Street" - lets remake the films with wasted potential!) - a bit more back story about what caused Miguel's "episode" in the first place could set him up as a much more sympathetic character (while at the same time developing the sister) and not actually showing us the Aunt's murder would help the mystery along no-end.
Over-all (like the first 2 films on our list) I can't openly recommend this one, but if it happens to be on, and you happen to have nothing to do, I've sat through worse (at least twice in the last 4 weeks).
Human Body Count: 7
Animal Body Count: 1
Boobs: 6 pairs
Most memorable death: Stabbed trough the boob.
Please use the comments bellow only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the "Reader Reviews" post for this movie.
28 May 2011
Absurd - Lisa's Review
So this kicks off the 'Video Nasty a week' challenge as undertaken by myself, Will and Darren. I'm relatively new to these kind of movies, so how well I do with regards to watching them all remains to be seen, but as an avid movie fan and someone who likes a challenge, I thought I'd give it a go.
My main thought after watching this movie is why on earth is it considered a 'nasty'? Why was it successfully prosecuted? I have read the background and was quite surprised that it seems a popular choice, it inspired a rock band so much they used the title as their name and it has even been compared to an Italian 'Halloween'. I did watch a lot of horrors in the 80's having a father who is a big horror fan and honestly found those much more horrific than this movie.
I don't expect much in the way of a storyline while watching these movies, but the entire cast here need enrolling for some kind of acting lessons. The adults overact or in the case of the first murder victim don't react facially at all, the actors paid to loan their voices to the movie (as its an Italian movie) sound like they are just reading badly from a page, but the most irritating thing of all is the little boy in the movie... Will. I would gladly take and shake him! That would probably make for some more horrific footage than anything shown here.
The music, rather than set the scene and add to the story, just bloody irritates you. I found myself sat turning the sound up and down the whole way through to block it out when it started. They really pushed the boat out with Bontempi for this one.
I also found this movie was cut together really badly. Rather than pass seamlessly from one scene to another, it sharply cuts from a scene of normality and dialogue to a murder scene.
Another irritation is one of those things a lot of movies feel the need to do which is explain every little thing, either with badly written dialogue or a jerky zoom in to whatever item they want you to realise tells the next part of the story..... I'm not thick.. let me work it out for myself!
With regards to the 'gore', Ok so I realise this is early 80's but having seen a lot of supposedly less gorey 80's horrors, this was nowhere near them in effects and realism. The blood was too red... regardless of where the victim was bleeding from. Surely the movie makers realise not all blood looks like poster paint. The consistency however is not bad. The fake skin is horrendous.. thats probably the worst bit. Rather than leave you feeling squeamish and horrified, it makes you laugh at how ridiculous it looks.
I will give the writer his dues, that the ideas behind the murders were generally good and had promise, had they been executed (no pun intended) properly.
In complete contrast however, the latter half of the film has a 'head in oven' scene which is very well done. Not very gorey but the make-up is great, its very realistic and avoids the temptation to overdo it, the effect works well, the acting is actually good in this part and you do feel the horror of the situation. It really made me wonder why they got the rest of the movie so wrong, when this part was so right?
I won't give the supposed 'twist' of the movie away but you'll probably (like me) see it coming a mile off. I wish they'd put more thought into how they were going to play out this scene as its a bit of an anti-climax to be honest and there is just too much wrong with it (by way of inconsistencies and 'its-a-miracle' like recoveries) to take any of it seriously. The closing scene has probably the best gore of the entire movie, but I don't think its worth wading through the rest of the dirge to get to this bit. On the other hand, its not bad enough to watch for laughs like some of these movies.
In conclusion, I'd say if you want to watch something for the gore, don't bother, theres bugger all in the way of proper gore here. If you want to feel tension and peril, again don't bother, there is more of all of these changing my sons nappy. Sadly if you want to view it for laughs with friends, again, its not quite bad enough to do that with either.
I would only recommend this to someone who, like us, wants to watch our way through this list just so they can see them all, say they have and hopefully find some gems in the process. I know there will be much worse than this movie (I've seen them) but I'm genuinely hoping on day 1 of this challenge, there is much better.
Oven Scene = 9/10
Gore = 2/10
Makeup = 5/10 (mostly for the oven scene)
Disgust Rating = 0/10
Story = 2/10
Acting = 3/10
Overall movie rating = 2/10
Please use the comments below only to comment on this post - to write your own review, please comment on the "Reader Reviews" post for this movie.
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