THE HEROIC TRIO (1993)

 Hong Kong version of a superhero movie that teams up 3 of their big actresses of the 90s Michelle Yeoh(as The Invisible Girl), Maggie Cheung(as a tough biker chick known as The Thief Catcher) and Anita Mui(as Wonder Woman). They face off against an evil baby-snatching demon and his henchman played by Anthony Wong. Even though this isn't quite a Category III film which is what I mainly know Wong from, it's still Hong Kong so you get a bloody scene where a baby ends up getting impaled on a nail and several cannibalistic children wetting themselves while being murdered. Prime comic book action for cult movie fans. Director Johnnie To would go on to make a bunch of cool action/thriller movies over the years. 

 There was a sequel, where it suddenly becomes a post-apocalyptical scenario, which came out the same year. 

                                             Terrible African hand-painted poster!:

MANSION OF THE LIVING DEAD (1982)

  Lina Romay(billed as Candy Coster) and 3 of her topless dancer co-workers go on vacation and end up at a spooky deserted hotel where horror ensues. This starts off as a pretty fun romp with plenty of lesbianic antics which is director Jess Franco's specialty and then turns into a sort-off rip-off of TOMBS OF THE BLIND DEAD with some hooded skull-faced Satanic killers running around. This is actually the 2nd movie I've seen that is a kinda "homage" to the BLIND DEAD, the first being NIGHT OF THE SKULL which this is certainly a step-up from. Drags in places but worth a watch if you're a sleaze-monger like myself. 

                                              Lesbo frolicking!: 

CURSE OF THE VOODOO (1965)

  This hunter(Bryant Haliday) kills a lion in Africa which unleashes the "voodoo curse" of the title although I don't think anything that we see counts as actual voodoo. Really dull British horror which mostly consists of our main character hallucinating about African warriors. I'm sure it's considered very racist by today's standards. AKA VOODOO BLOOD DEATH

Released in America on a double bill with the cheezier but more watchable FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE SPACE MONSTER:

SHIVERS (1975)

  Big fan of director David Cronenberg but his first horror film here has never really been my favorite. It's kind of a zombie movie except these zombies are really horny! Oh and they're actually controlled by a parasite that sneaks around like a slug and crawls into people's orifices(including the great Barbara Steele in a bathtub). Lynn Lowry gets naked for no reason and we get lots of orgy scenes to go along with the murderous rampages. Still an impressive early movie clearly made on a low budget with ideas that would be more fleshed out in years to come. AKA IT CAME FROM WITHIN and THEY CAME FROM WITHIN

Known in Italy as THE DEMON UNDER THE SKIN:

DANGEROUS CHARTER (1962)

  While watching this I couldn't help but think about how the early 60s might be one of the worst times for cinema. I mean they're not as bad as today, or anything post the year 2000 with all the CGI nonsense, but given that they were preceded by the kitschiness of the 50s and then followed by the grittiness of the late 60s and 70s they were pretty awful in comparison for the most part and here's a prime example of that. Some fishermen find an abandoned boat and then get involved with some gangsters and that's pretty much the whole plot! Not exactly the most action packed film I've ever seen and what pisses me off the most about this is that they snuck it into a DVD set of biker movies which this is clearly not. Supposedly shot in 5 days which I can certainly believe. Roger Corman coulda done better!

                     Not a bad trailer for such a leisurely-paced movie: 

LEGENDARY WEAPONS OF CHINA (1982)

  Being more of a fan of the Shaw Brothers' 70s output this one fell a little short for me. Of course there are the amazing sets and fights, and you get Gordon Liu playing an ominous bad guy, but I wasn't fond of the comedy bits thrown in, with Alexander Fu Sheng and a voodoo doll, which seemed to spoof earlier kung fu movies. It was also a bit confusing  for the first quarter of the movie or so and I really couldn't tell you what was going on until it all settled down and became clear.  There sure are a lot of weapons on display here though, which get their own subtitles, so that's something. It's also kind of interesting that the idea for this movie is taken from history where Chinese would practice martial arts in the belief that it would make them impervious to the bullets of invading Westerners. Spoiler alert - it didn't work so well.

                    Thai poster where it's known as 18 LEGENDARY WEAPONS OF CHINA:

LONE WOLF (1988)

  Got to see this last night playing in a theater, which is kinda weird because it was originally only released to video. Very basic 80s werewolf movie, with some fairly decent transformation scenes, thanks to director Ted Bohus, which are inspired by AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON, mixed with an almost SAVED BY THE BELL plot involving a struggling up and coming rock band and high school kids all played by folks who could easily be in their 30s or 40s. Michael J. Fox and TEEN WOLF get name checked and our mysterious werewolf gets to slashing. Maybe worth a one-time watch if you're a werewolf cinema completist. 

Known as TEENAGE WEREWOLF in Denmark:

AFTER PARTY MASSACRE (2011)

 Rather than an actual movie-watching experience this felt way more like viewing a very specific fetish video. If death metal, slasher movies and metal chicks in various states of undress all mixed together in what's basically a really long music video seem like something that might turn you on maybe give it a gander. The list of atrocities include castration, dismemberment by miter saw, death by dildo, sledgehammer, axe and other implements of destruction. The bands Soulless and Incantation(whose drummer is also our main character) are featured.

THE NIGHT EVELYN CAME OUT OF THE GRAVE (1971)

  This Italian horror is about half a giallo and half a more standard horror where we clearly see who the killer is and there's no mystery at all. You get kinky s & m killings, black-gloved killer, flesh-eating foxes, a skull-faced apparition and a mystery that's pretty easy to figure out. Not the greatest example of Eurotrash cinema but capable enough and it's always cool to see Erica Blanc show up in one of these types of films. AKA THE NIGHT SHE ROSE FROM THE TOMB

SCUM OF THE EARTH (1974)

 Better known as POOR WHITE TRASH PART II(even though it has nothing to do with the first movie which was made 17 years before and was just retitled this in 1976) this might be one of the ultimate versions of a film portraying shitty Southern folks. You get a child bride, rape, incest, a whole family of retards, possum-eating and a maniacal axe-wielding murderer on the loose to make this a sorta-proto-slasher. A bit talky in spots which make it seem longer than it's 90 minute runtime but worth a one-time watch for lovers of real redneck hicksploitation cinema.

 Director S.F. Brownrigg had made DON'T LOOK IN THE BASEMENT a year earlier and this one is not quite on the same level as that drive-in classic.  

THE BOXER FROM SHANTUNG (1972)

  Watching the full uncut version of this recently made me realize how censored down these Shaw Brothers movies were back when I used to watch them on TV as a little kid. There's lots of blood on show here, especially in the big final fight which is the highlight of the movie, which was not in any version I ever saw of this before. A bit on the long side at 2 hours and 14 minutes the ending really makes up for it if you can endure. AKA KILLER FROM SHANTUNG

 There have a been a couple of remakes of this over the years including 1997's HERO which I haven't seen and 2014's ONCE UPON A TIME IN SHANGHAI which is nowhere near as good as the original. 

HELL ON WHEELS (1967)

  Well this movie has a cool title but that's about it unless you happen to be a big fan of country singer Marty Robbins and/or watching cars drive around in a circle briskly. John Ashley plays Marty's brother even though they don't look much alike and there is a plot in between all the singing and racing about him being jealous of his big brother's success. In addition to this they also squeeze in what seems like a propaganda film for the federal government to remind us how terrible moonshine is. 

 I own this in a DVD set of biker movies which I was hoping this would be but was sadly letdown.