DEAD AND BREAKFAST (2004)

  This is one of those dreaded horror/comedy mash-ups that all the cool kids love. I guess we can blame THE EVIL DEAD franchise for that. This one comes complete with terrible rockabilly songs, terrible rap songs, a retarded dancing zombies(I guess technically they're demons but they sure act a lot like zombies) sequence. Some of the actors here went on to do other notable things but the only one I really recognize is Jeffrey Dean Morgen as the sheriff who went on to be Negan in THE WALKING DEAD series. David Carradine shows up for a quick paycheck and Anthony Perkin's son Oz ends up becoming zombified/demonized and plays the main baddie from there on out. On the plus side there's quite a bit of gore in between the stupidity. I probably wouldn't have ever bothered with this if it wasn't part of a recent movie night gathering with some friends. 

DEATH WHISTLES THE BLUES (1964)

  This is an early Jess Franco flick and is part of his "film noir" series. It's pretty atypical of what Franco would do later on. There's no nudity, excessive zoom lens action and the plot is pretty straight forward. Unlike where most noirs are set this takes place primarily in Jamaica and not some dark city. You get multiple shootings, fist fights, mystery and intrigue all in dazzling black and white. While I do prefer the more outrageous sleazy epics Uncle Jess would give us in the later decades I will try and check out more of his early stuff to see some of his more competent filmmaking. 

Given the very James Bond-ish title of AGENT 077: OPERATION JAMAICA in French-speaking countries:

DEMON LUST (1980)

  While this is technically a rape/revenge movie it has to be one of the tamest and slowest-moving examples of that sleazy subgenre of thriller. It does have some parallels to the vastly superior STRAW DOGS in that it deals with a couple having marital problems tasked to deal with some local scumbag rape-happy hooligans.  Most of the movie sadly features our main couple forlornly looking at each other, the rape scenes happen off-screen and the revenge isn't all that particularly enthralling. I did read somewhere that this was a made-for-TV deal but unless South Africa(where this was made) had some weird idea of wholesome family entertainment in the 80s, given the subject matter here, that seems a little hard to believe. AKA SAVAGE ENCOUNTER

There aren't any actual "demons" in this and it's not even really a horror film but I'm sure this title helped rent a few VHS tapes back in the day!:

ALWAYS ON MONDAY (1964)

  Better known as MY TALE IS HOT(the version I watched actually had both titles pop up!) this is a 60s sexploitation/nudie-cutie flick where the devil tries to get a married man to not be such a faithful husband. Complete with a twist ending this is a goofy relic that's worth a look for something bizarre. Famous stripper of the time. Candy Barr shows up in some footage that obviously looks like it came from something else. The cheap-ass Lucifer outfit looks like it would fit right into that Mexican SANTA CLAUS movie. Would make for good background footage at your local trendy hipster bar.  

THE MONSTER OF PIEDRAS BLANCAS (1959)

  One of my all-time favorite 50s monster on the loose flicks. The monster here is basically a beefier version of THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON with an extra-ugly head(and since he's land-based is really closest to the villain of THE CREATURE WALKS AMONG US). Unlike ol' classic Creech though this monster rips people's heads right off and walks around with them which was pretty wild stuff for 1959! While obviously not as iconic as the Universal monsters this guy will always hold a special place in my heart and should be loved by any self-respecting monster kid out there.

Also the fact that he adorned one of my favorite punk rock band's album cover gave him extra street cred in my book!:

Originally played with OKEFENOKEE which was some crime drama set in the swamp.

                                                     "Shock award winner!":

BLOOD BEACH (1980)

 Released around the same time as JAWS 2 the idea here seems to have been "lets take the menacing monster from those movies and just move it to the sand". There doesn't really seem to be too many other idea at work though. You do get Paulie(John Saxon) from ROCKY and John Saxon doing decent enough jobs as cops though there's not ever really much mystery as to what is going on. 

 Sort-of Spoiler alert - the monster ends to being a something that looks like the giant man-eating flower from LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS.

 There's an uncut extended version of this with a little more gore in the attack scenes.