DRAG ME TO HELL (2009)

 Director Sam Raimi is, of course, beloved by horror fans thanks to his EVIL DEAD series. After those he made a few movies no one seems to care much about and some big budget Hollywood SPIDER-MAN flicks that more mainstream-types might enjoy and then he returned to horror with this. While not the worst thing I've ever seen it's a far cry from his younger years in terms of intense horror. Perhaps that PG-13 rating and yearning for mass-acceptance had something to do with that. I actually watched the "director's cut" so I guess I got a little more blood being thrown around still nothing all that extreme. Some terrible c.g.i. and a very Hollywood-feel to everything didn't help either. It doesn't go with the traditional ending, I'll give it credit for that, unfortunately I saw the ending(and a few other plot points) coming a mile away. This certainly made me long for the days of rapist trees.

 

DR. BLACK & MR. HYDE (1976)

                                          "This situation is rapidly becoming insalubrious!"

 Dr. Black(Bernie Casey), who is actually named Dr. Pride, takes a magical serum that turns him into the evil Mr. Hyde(or Mr. White as this movie is also known in certain circles), an evil murderous white man with super strength. While this might be viewed as a bit of a racist film(but don't worry it's mainly just racist against white folks) it's also a pretty cool example of 70s blaxploitation(which in itself is now viewed as being racist against black folks to some more "woke"/"progressive"-types so that sounds like a pretty equality-filled feature to me). Probably one of the least scary horror films you will see, it works more as weird allegory about the dangers of drug-abuse or maybe just being too white?? All I know is we get a funky pimp character, named Silky, who takes on a car with a switchblade, hos tossed around like ragdolls by our White-enstein monster and there's even the classic KING KONG ending to top things all off. Nowhere near as iconic as BLACULA(also directed by William Crain) but it would make a good double-feature with that one. AKA THE WATTS MONSTER and DECISION FOR DOOM

                                  One of the all-time great trailers!!(and the birth of Rap!):




                                                  The 3 faces(and titles) of Dr. Black!:

BLOOD FEAST 2: ALL YOU CAN EAT (2002)

 Director(and Godfather of gore!) H.G. Lewis stopped making movies back in 1972 with his epic swan song THE GORE GORE GIRLS. Unfortunately he then returned in the dreaded 2000s with this sequel to his first gore-filled classic BLOOD FEAST. While over the top gore was quite the novel spectacle back in 1963, by 2002 every hack who could hold a video camera was spewing out this kind of garbage(usually in some sort of zombie film but I digress). I guess Lewis' idea was to make this one a blatant comedy also which might work if anything in the movie was humorous. Sadly the humor is of the "hey watch this fat guy eat stuff"-level and the "hey isn't it wacky how this dead body keeps popping up in different scenes?"-type so don't expect to crack many belly laughs here. I did get some genuine laughs when director John Waters(perhaps the only person who can sorta act in this whole movie?) shows up as a pervy child-loving priest but his scenes amount to only a few minutes. Also the music, which is mostly rockabilly-type stuff, was pretty decent.

 Lewis would go on to make 2 more films before he croaked in 2016(one of which, HERSCHELL GORDON LEWIS' BLOODMANIA, seems to have been released after his death) but I'm not sure I need to see those. I'd like to remember him for his trailblazing 60s/70s schlock-o-ramas. Having met Mr. Lewis at horror conventions I couldn't help but notice he didn't have any of his newer DVDs for sale so I'll assume these weren't his proudest achievements(or maybe there were some legal issues I'm not aware of).
 For a way better sequel to BLOOD FEAST check out BLOOD DINER from the 80s.

SCARECROWS (1988)

 Ultra-simplistic plot about some soldiers who rob an Army base, hijack a plane and then end up in a field full of murderous scarecrows. The only real selling point here is the various gory kills involving pitchforks, knives and sickles. They also have some pretty neat-looking monsters and are able to create a pretty spooky atmosphere despite what was obviously a pretty low budget. Things get a bit tedious after awhile since we never really leave this one location. There is an r-rated cut of this out there on VHS which seems like it would be a terrible choice to watch.

THE RAID 2 (2014)

 Like most of these more modern Asian action flicks this one runs super long at 2 and a half hours but somehow they manage to pull it off here without inducing sleep and/or boredom. The fight scenes, just like in the first film, are pretty exceptional. The action set-pieces, including an amazing car chase sequence, are shot really well and the best part is they keep the stupid c.g.i. to a minimum which probably wasn't easy to do in these current times. There are a couple of more cartoonish characters, a double-hammer swinging lass and a baseball hitting fellow, that reminded me of something that Quentin Tarantino would have thrown into one of his films, but they work here nonetheless. I put of watching this one for a while because the first movie was so good and I expected to be let down by the sequel but this one is at least equal, if not superior, to THE RAID just by virtue of how they made the plot a bit more complex and opened the world up to our main character(Iko Uwais) so now we get prison violence, mobster hijinks, barroom slaughters etc and it's all done with plenty of blood flowing craziness. It was also great to see Mad Dog(Yayan Ruhian) back as another equally bad-ass character here who takes out a whole slew of Japanese assassins in a pretty epic battle. One of the best martial-arts/action flicks I've seen in a long time. AKA THE RAID 2: BERANDAL and THE RAID: RETALIATION

MOONSTALKER (1989)

 Right down there at the bottom of the barrel of 80s slasher movies there's probably a bunch of shot-on-video junk and only slightly above that this turd floats. I call it a turd but there are a couple of bright spots worthy of a chuckle or two. One of which is this extremely southern redneck dad of this family of campers. Sadly, this being a stalk n slash flick and all, he doesn't make it through much of the film. Also the killer here looks sorta cool in his straight-jacket complete with absurd over-the-face hood attachment. Sadly again he ditches this ensemble halfway through his killing rampage to put on some kinda Marlboro man-looking outfit. The kills are mostly done offscreen to save on any bloody fx work and there's one ridiculous kill where a gal gets offed by hot shower water touching her face. Overall a pretty forgettable generic slasher but at least they shot it on film(16mm to be exact) so it looks o.k. AKA CAMPER STAMPER

Complete film on Youtube(annoying soundtrack and all!):

EATEN ALIVE (1976)

 Director Tobe Hooper followed up his classic THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE with this kinda similar horror tale of a hotel run by wacko Neville Brand who likes to feed various folks that set him off, for one reason or another, to his extra-large crocodile that he keeps in a moat under his establishment. Probably the best way to describe this film is that it's kinda like TCM but not quite as good. This isn't to say it's a bad watch since TCM is, by my estimation, one of the greatest horror movies ever made. Instead of a chainsaw you get a bunch of scythe violence plus lots of croc-chomping goodness(apparently this croc hadn't been fed in a long time before these events take place!). In addition to that there's a young Freddy Krueger(Robert Englund) shouting the famous line "Name's Buck and I'm rarin' to fuck"-line that Quentin Tarantino would recycle for KILL BILL, an old Morticia Addams(Carolyn Jones of THE ADDAMS FAMILY) and Marilyn Burns playing pretty much the same character she did in a year earlier in TCM. It never really manages to build the tension the way 'SAW does but still a solid Hooper entry. AKA BRUTES AND SAVAGES, DEATH TRAP, SLAUGHTER HOTEL, HORROR HOTEL, HORROR HOTEL MASSACRE, LEGEND OF THE BAYOU, MURDER ON THE BAYOU and STARLIGHT SLAUGHTER
 Mr. Tobe would go on to become a technically better director but sadly more mainstream after this.

Croc horror meets Marilyn Chambers horror!:

PRIVATE PARTS (1972)

 Paul Bartel, besides being a great character actor that shows up in many Roger Corman-produced films, was also a pretty amazing director. This is his first feature, after making a few short films, and it's a pretty awesome bit of cinematic weirdness. The plot sorta plays like a murder mystery but the killing seem to take a backseat along the way to just general strange goings on at an old hotel. There's an oddball cast of characters(including my favorite a flaming gay leather-daddy priest), a see-through blow-up doll that gets filled with water and blood for quite the visual, and a final message that's sure to offend most trannys in the year 2019(then again what doesn't?). Bartel name drops ALICE DOESN'T LIVE HERE ANYMORE except that movie didn't come out until 2 years later(so I guess he has prescient psychic abilities as well!). The character of Aunt Martha always makes me think of the movie titled SOMETIMES AUNT MARTHA DOES DREADFUL THINGS because she does! Definitely more rewatchable than that Howard Stern movie of the same name. Watch it ona  double-feature with Bartel's equally wacky EATING RAOUL for a added thrills.

KARATE WARRIORS (1976)

 Sonny Chiba plays pretty much the same character here as he did in THE STREET FIGHTER here and that's his usual badass persona. The plot deals with 2 brothers who head up opposing gangs of drug-dealing mobsters that are causing chaos throughout a Japanese city(which city I'm not sure they ever clarify since the cheapass dollar DVD-version I have of this has a few unfortunate audio problems.) There's also a samurai swordsman character, who seems to have stepped out of a ZATOICHI film or something, that is the father of a little boy that luckily doesn't say too much and isn't as annoying as children often are in these types of films.  Lots of karate and sword-fights ensue. Hands, arms and blood flies. A pretty decent martial-arts/gangster mix that I've seen listed as the final entry in THE STREET FIGHTER series which it really wasn't but it's at least as good as some of the sequels to that one. AKA KILLING FIST AND CHILD