LORNA THE EXORCIST (1974)

  Lina Romay stars in this Jess Franco-directed sleaze flick as a 17-year old girl who falls victim to a demonic curse set in motion by her father before she was even born. Of course her playing an underage girl doesn't stop her from being completely naked and experiencing some kinky lesbian antics throughout a good portion of the movie including gratuitous pubic hair munching. There's a pretty uncomfortable-looking penetration by a wooden dildo, incest abounding and Howard Vernon playing the tough henchman of our main demon-lady Lorna(Pamela Stanford wearing some crazy glam-looking eye makeup). Franco himself shows up as a terribly ineffective psychiatrist. Not my favorite Franco but it is growing on me with repeated watches and the scene where a lady dies by getting actual genital crabs is pretty killer!  

 IMDB erroneously lists  a couple of different versions of this but it looks like they're mixing whatever those various versions are called up with Franco's EXCORCISM so thanks for the added confusion IMDB!

               AKA LINDA A DEVILISH NIGHTMARE:

THE FAT BLACK PUSSYCAT (1963)

"Some of my best friends are existentialists!"

  I had always assumed this was an old sexploitation flick based on the title but turns out it's more in the roughie category. So rough in fact that's it's basically a slasher flick(or maybe even a giallo since the killer wears black leather gloves!) since it focuses on the murders of various women around New York's Greenwich Village. Wavy Gravy of Woodstock-fame shows up as a cop looking a bit different than the hippie he would become in a couple of years.  Beatniks get assaulted and snuffed out and it all ends with an explanation about how being a homosexual cross-dresser leads to becoming a psychopath. Probably not the most PC message in today's ultra-sensitive times. Sadly the black cat that shows up at every murder scene isn't all that fat and more sadly they seem to have forgotten to show any real nudity in this.

BLOODEATERS (1980)

 This is a pretty fun zombie flick. better known as TOXIC ZOMBIES, about some pot farmers who get sprayed with an experimental herbicide that turns them into murderous cannibalistic(bloodeating?) maniacs. John Amplas, MARTIN himself, shows up as one of the evil federal agents. While it's no all-time classic it's certainly a good watch for zombie/gore completists. 

 The video version of this is slightly longer with a tacked-on ending that doesn't add anything of importance to the plot.

Released on video in England(one of the video nasties) as FOREST OF FEAR: 

A "VIDEO FOR PLEASURE" in The Netherlands!:

BEST FRIENDS (1975)

 Richard Hatch, who was Apollo in the old BATTLESTAR GALACTICA TV show, stars in this drama about a couple of pals driving around in an RV with their chicks. Very leisurely paced film where not a lot happens for long stretches. It does get a bit more intense during the big finale and then forgets to actually have an ending. Some of the posters make this out to be some kinda American Indian revenge exploitation flick but that's only dealt with in a very minor scene. The majority of the film is a more introspective look at growing up and touches on some possibly homo-erotic bromance between our main 2 characters. Not a bad film to put on if you want to take a nap.

HATCHET (2006)

                                                          "Your nipples are dumb!"

  Kane Hodder plays a very Jason-like killer in this attempt to emulate 80s slasher flicks in the 2000s. This is about as basic as any of these movies gets and feels like a real waste of time when it's all over and done. You do get some very gory death scenes(at least in the uncut version I watched) that I think are mostly done without CGI but I'm not sure I cared much about anybody in the whole movie. Somehow this was popular enough at the time to warrant 3 sequels. I guess when you compare it to other horror flicks from this decade it's not any better or worse than most of them. 

 Robert England has a small role before getting offed. 

                                                     The retro-looking poster!:

BKO: BANGKOK KNOCKOUT (2010)

 Exhausting amount of insane stunt work and wall-to-wall fight scenes pretty accurately describe most of this Thai martial arts fest. The story is pretty basic and involves a bunch of fighters who end up in some staged event, being gambled on by some rich folks, where they have to fight for their life. There's ninjas, a masked axe-wielding maniac right out of a slasher movie, fights on motorbikes, cars, trucks and all kinds of Muay Thai madness going on. Not the most complex plot and while it moves along swiftly it can be a bit tiresome at a one hour and 46 minute runtime.  

VAMPARIAH (2016)

 If I just describe this movie it sounds like it could possibly be cool. You get multiple aswangs(those Filipino monsters that can separate their bodies and fly around sucking blood and killing fetuses) fighting each other, a couple of those hopping vampires and a bunch of monster hunters who seem to be doing an impression of Blade by wearing all-leather outfits. Unfortunately it was made in 2016 so all the not very special FX were done with CGI so it all looks like total garbage. The crappy techno music also doesn't help much. I did appreciate the joke about Americans not being able to pronounce the word "aswang" correctly though. 

 This is actually a remake of a movie from 2006 called BAMPINAY which looks to be a similar situation of Filipinos shooting a movie in California.

 

MAN'S BEST FRIEND (1993)

  Having only seen the trailer back in the day I had always assumed this was about a killer robot dog(something like THE TERMINATOR on 4 legs) on the loose. It's actually about a dog that's genetically spliced with a bunch of other animals to make it the ultimate watchdog (or killing machine if there are any mishaps, so guess what happens).  While not up to the wackiness of the great animals run amok flicks of the 70s this was a pretty decent watch and considering it was made in the 90s, when most horror films were complete wastes of time, it's surprisingly entertaining. Ally Sheedy and Lance Henriksen do a great job in something that could otherwise be pretty shlocky. 

20 MILLION MILES TO EARTH (1957)

 

 One of the all-time great 50s monster movies. This time our giant monster, who hails from Venus, starts out very small before rapidly growing. Ray Harryhausen's amazing stop-motion creature, named The Ymir, is obviously the big highlight here. Like with all the great monsters you feel bad for the creature since he's kidnapped from his home planet and we're even told he's not really aggressive unless provoked, so what does everyone do? Provoke him at every opportunity of course!  I do kinda also feel bad for that elephant though. Simple yet engaging classic.

GORE FROM OUTER SPACE (2001)

  This title here promises something potentially pretty cool. Perhaps a bloody alien invasion romp will ensue? Nah, instead of anything like that let's just have a bunch of semi-comedic scenes thrown together that really don't seem to tell any kind of a coherent story but are loosely about a woman who maybe encounters aliens and maybe has a daughter who is kidnapped and maybe can shape shift into a balding fellow. I have to keep saying maybe because nothing is very clear after watching this thing. Maybe if you're really into weirdo David Lynch movies this might be more appealing to you. 

 This is technically a sequel to director Hirohisa Sasaki's CRAZY LIPS which I don't think I've ever viewed so maybe if you've seen that first things might make a little more sense though I kinda doubt it. 

THE WITCH'S MIRROR (1962)

 Mexican horror concerning a witch who uses her magical mirror to helps a poor murdered woman get revenge from beyond the grave on her cheating scumbag killer husband. It almost feels like 2 movies because about halfway through your fairly typical witchy vengeance story suddenly becomes an EYES WITHOUT A FACE rip-off. Director Chano Urueta was also responsible for some of those groovy old Blue Demon lucha libre flicks of the 60s and 70s.

 

THE BOYS NEXT DOOR (1985)

  Director Penelope Spheeris followed her 2 punk rock classics(SUBURBIA and THE DECLINE OF WESTENR CIVILIZATION) with this tale of 2 directionless losers(Charlie Sheen and Maxwell Caulfield) who graduate high school, take a trip to L.A. and become homicidal killers upon arrival. There is still a punk aesthetic here, with the soundtrack featuring Iggy Pop and The Cramps among others, but this is clearly Spheeris' first step into mainstream Hollywood which I don't personally find quite as interesting.  The film makes a good attempt at portraying teen alienation and misdirected violence in a somewhat realistic manner though it seemed like these 2 knuckleheads should have been apprehended much sooner than they were since they made zero effort in covering their tracks at any point. Despite this still an interesting 80s thriller that falls somewhere between teen melodrama and chilling serial killer dramatization. 

  Frank Zappa's daughter Moon Unit shows up in a small part as a classmate. 

Released on German video as BLIND RAGE:

MY HONEYMOON WITH A VAMPIRE (2003)

  This is a real snoozefest! Shot on video in 2003, so you know it's probably going to suck, it feels more like you're watching some boring travelogue involving a newlywed couple than an exciting narrative. Certainly not much of note takes place for most of the runtime. Our main male character turns into a vampire because of some evil giant ball of dirt, bites a few people then a ghost-lady shows up and tells him about how she got murdered by her husband. From there it's vampire/ghost tag-team revenge time. Very minimal blood or enjoyment to be had. Works good as a sleeping aid. AKA VAMPIRE HONEYMOON