"Curtains" (1983) d/ Jonathan Stryker

Apologies for an erratic August as usual, review-wise, here, I've been squeezing in all my late summer partying, and along with that, comes the inevitable late summer slacking. How about you? Have an unforgettably raucous and decadent week in Bermuda that you documented with thirteen thousand pictures you're going to graciously share with the rest of us, via Instagram? Who cares. Cult movies are our champers in the tub here, snots n boogs, and here's a surprisingly proficient slasher from C to the -anada that utilizes one of the creepier giant sized little girl dolls in recent memory (it's got the face of that weatherbeaten broad down at the far corner of the bar who's looking for a Wednesday night charity pumpin', oof-ah.) and an effective latex hag masked giallo-style killer among a gathering of would-be leading ladies of the cinema that includes Lynne Griffin, Samantha Eggar, Lesleh Donaldson, and Canadian ballet dancer Anne Ditchburn. Oh yeah, Dean Wormser's in there, too, and throw in a nasty-looking sickle, just for kicks, while we're at it. The whole affair was directed by Richard Ciupka, under the alias Jonathan Stryker, the director character's name in the movie. I see what you did there...


Not bad for starters, but seriously, where's the grapes, mirror fulla coke, and most importantly, the two other chicks? "Sorry, I can't hear you. As you can plainly see,  we're having eighties hot tub sex with each other."(Matt Berry voice)
Wow, that was a busy caption. Too many episodes of IT Crowd and Snuff Box rolling around in me brains, 'innit? Shoulda rolled with a simple play on words or something. Back to the story. After allowing marquee star Samantha Sherwood (Samantha Eggar) to get herself institutionalized to research her upcoming role as the highly disturbed Audra in his latest film, Jonathan Stryker (John Vernon) conveniently forgets about her while she's among the loonies, and announces that he'll be re-casting the role on a private weekend at his out-of-the-way mansion in Variety magazine, which just so happens to have a subscriber in the same squirrel farm that Sherwood is indefinitely checked into. Naturally, she escapes in time to show up as an uninvited sixth actress to audition, since the original sixth woman is mysteriously snagged on a miserable looking little girl doll strategically propped up in the middle of the road in the rainy downpour, and promptly mowed down by a car before she can emote for the womanizing director.


Tonya Harding takes it to another level. More at eleven...
Of course, there's still Patti (Lynne Griffin) the comedian/comedienne (...do we even distinguish between the two anymore? Just a thought.) whose flat, predictable jokes lead her to try out for the part, Laurian (Anne Ditchburn) the contorting interpretive dancer, Christie (Lesleh Donaldson) the ice skater who has a memorable slo mo incident on the frozen pond with our murderous pal in the hag mask, Brooke (Linda Thorson) the established actress, and Tara (Sandee Currie) the aspiring musician, all jockeying for position with the puppeteer Stryker, who's not ashamed to go from bedroom to bedroom in his inclusive elimination process. Nobody's too surprised to see Samantha, who's fresh from an asylum escape, and eager to bicker quietly in the shadows with Stryker, as the masked figure whittles down the would-be competition, each in their own creative manner, of course. These cinematic serial killers always seem to keep us well entertained over an hour and a half with their homicidal shenanigans, don't they? And wouldn't you know it, they even had the heart to throw in your obligatory twist ending, too. Thanks, guys.


I'd feel worse for her if her shoulder wasn't visible in the bottom of the frame, Gods love 'er.
Lesleh Donaldson made quite a name for herself in genre movies during the eighties, appearing in Funeral Home (1980), Happy Birthday to Me (1981), and Deadly Eyes (1982) in succession at the outset of the blood-stained era. Lynne Griffin you'll no doubt remember from Benjamin "Bob" Clark's highly celebrated seasonal slasher opus, Black Christmas (1974), and perhaps one of the greatest cult comedies of the eighties, in Strange Brew (1983), as well. Ms. Eggar is no stranger to our favorite genre either, with titles like Cronenberg's The Brood (1979), The Uncanny (1976), The Exterminator (1980), and Demonoid: Messenger of Death (1981),  all under her belt. If you don't instantly recognize John Vernon as Dean Wormser from Animal House (1978), you'll surely recall one of his half million genre credits, from Dirty Harry (1971) to the Chiodos' Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988). Synapse released a remastered print of the film on all formats earlier this year, each with a smattering of choice extras, so hunt it down, if you haven't already gotten it, that is,  me 'ol beauties. Like... Arrrrgghhhh. On the scale, this set of Curtains draws itself a respectable pair of Wops, and is well worth checking out. Nicely done, Canada. Nicely done.


She's probably relieved that the killer's only cutting her head off, and not cutting footloose (Eff you, Kenny Loggins).

"Mortuary" (1983) d/ Howard Avedis

From exploitation king Howard Avedis, the man responsible for drive-in gems like The Teacher (1974) and Sybill Danning boob-nanza, They're Playing With Fire (1984), comes tonight's review, a golden era slasher that features the likes of a scene-chewing Bill Paxton along with Lynda Day George and her husband Christopher in what would be his final role, and let's not exclude a memorable trailer that featured cult legend Michael Berryman, who's interestingly nowhere to be found in the final cut of the film. Though it's pretty standard stuff, borrowing from a handful of earlier genre movies, it can boast of nude scenes from bonny auburn lass Mary Beth McDonough, who you'll remember played Erin on The Waltons. A foine ting, that.


"What a last movie to remember me by!", ponders Hank (Christopher George).
Christie (Mary Beth McDonough) suspects that her father's pre-credit chlorinated pool-death was no accident, her suspicions only strengthened by the onset of nightmares, sleepwalking into the pool in a nightie, and the feeling that she's being tailed by a hooded freak in a morgue wagon. Her goofy boyfriend Greg (David Wallace) doesn't help matters, spying on local undertaker Hank Andrews (Christopher George) as he leads a candlelit ceremony at his warehouse, decked out in red robes, with Christie's mom, Eve (Lynda Day George), in attendance, and getting a tire-heisting pal skewered on an embalming tool in the process. In the meantime, pay no mind to Hank's creepy son, Paul (Bill Paxton), who's got a slightly unhealthy crush on Christie, himself, and is taken to lurking about like a weirdo when he isn't slamming embalming tools into cadavers under dad's militant supervision. Hey, nobody ever mistook this for a murder mystery...


She must be watching dailies from her performance in "Pieces"(1983).
Just as Greg and Christie's investigative spying rules out Hank and Eve, who've been using secret seances to get to the bottom of the girl's father's untimely death, her stalker turns out to be Paul to nobody's surprise, decked out in gothy corpsepaint and hood, eager to terrorize the girl and her mother at the house during a power outage, after Christie wisely interrupts a screw on the living room floor to tell Greg she doesn't want to see him for a while, leaving nobody to protect the women later when Paul gets murderously pokey with his tool again. Hank interrupts Paul's impromptu Happy Birthday to Me (1981)-style wedding at the mortuary, with slumped corpses all seated around the groom and his naked bride-to-be(embalmed), and eats bossy father-type death for his troubles. Greg saves the day with a loaded M-16 he found stashed in a coffin earlier (I would have thrown the top hat at him, but that's just me), only to have the mother's corpse-in-attendance spring to life for a final attack a la Buio Omega (1980) or Pieces (1982). Take your pick.


"You bring up that Fish Heads video again, and I'll embalm ya, brah!", warns Paul (Bill Paxton).
David Wallace, who you may have seen in Humongous(1982), went on to a career in television and soap operas. After Christopher's death, Lynda Day George would appear solely in tv roles, with Mortuary serving as her last horror movie appearance to date, as well. Paxton shows up in everything from The Terminator (1984) to Aliens (1986) to Brain Dead (1990) and The Dark Backward (1991), before famously scoring roles in major studio flicks like Titanic, Twister, and Tombstone. On the scale, a mostly predictable cookie cutter slasher with more boobs than blood and more chuckles than atmosphere, and as such, it merits a single Wop. Mehhhh...


Dead chicks can't feel it when you insert the tool. Mortician/necrophiliac jokes make the world go around.

"A Nightmare on Elm Street" (2010) d/ Sam Bayer

Yeah, I know, I know. Freddy Krueger review. I'm a big fat liar whose flame-enveloped 501's are putting third-degree burns on my admittedly elephantine cazzies, on this end. After seeing 'nuff  net-gativity towards the 2010 reboot, which I hadn't bothered catching (like most of the original series...ziiing), coming from hardcore fans of he of the finger-knives, floppy fedora, and ugly sweater-fame (a character personified for three decades by character actor and genre fave, Robert Englund, for better or worse), I decided that I ought to give the remake a look. I'd always felt that Wes Craven had some solid ideas on his pioneer excursion to Elm Street back in '84, if handled differently, for lack of better words, and a fresh approach might work in the remake's favor in this regard. First of all, casting Jackie Earle Haley, who's made a career out of playing ugly little creeps (dating at least as far back as the friggin' Partridge Family), as Krueger is a genius move, away from the familiar wisecracking horror cornball favorite for ages eight and under.


Shakey-shake...shake it. Come on, pilgrim, you know he loves you.
Russell's at the diner, waiting for his girlfriend Kris to show up, when he dozes off, and is seemingly dispatched in his dream by a horribly burned yet somehow familiar man wearing a fedora, gaudy Christmas-colored sweater, and a glove full of finger knives, though outwardly, it appears that he's slashed his own throat and committed suicide. Kris witnesses in horror, begins to dream about the same mysterious man, then suffers the same fate one night as she's invisibly tossed around her bedroom and slashed to death in front of her ex-boyfriend Jesse's eyes. Jesse runs to Nancy's house to tell her his story, to find that she, too, has been dreaming the same dreams, before being arrested and jailed for Kris' murder, where he also falls victim to the shadowy sleep murderer. Nancy (Rooney Mara) begins to notice a pattern in the teen slayings, eventually discovering that she attended a preschool with all the victims, and that the man she's been dreaming about was a quirky little gardener there named Fred Krueger (Haley) that abused all the children before being run out of town...


Freddy transforms a tittilating teen into a forgotten chocolate bar left in some fat kid's pocket.
When Nancy's friend Quentin (Kyle Gallner) falls asleep during a swim team practice, he envisions his parents among the angry mob that corners a terrified Krueger and burns him alive, leading the teens to believe that they'd perhaps lied to their parents about the abuse as children, and that Freddy has been infiltrating their dreamscape to exact bloody revenge from beyond the grave for their lies. Except, in the climactic showdown at the preschool, they discover that Freddy really wants to kill them all for telling the truth, as his secret toddler-torturing room is stumbled upon, complete with kiddie crayon drawings and half-fabricated finger knives. Drawing upon a piece of sweater that Nancy managed to pull out of an earlier dream, the two devise a plan to do the same to Krueger involving syringes full of adrenalin, finishing him off when he emerges into reality. Believing they've done just that, Nancy sets the preschool ablaze with Freddy's corpse inside, ending the incredible nightmare, once and for all. At home, Nancy notices Krueger in a mirror's reflection, just as he slams his finger knives out of the mirror into the back of her mother's unsuspecting head. Roll credits.


Snarky captions to Elm Street screen caps seem a bit redundant, don't they?
I even thought about laying three wops on this one, but let's face it, that's just crazy fucking talk, man. Still, where I experienced corny non-scares throughout my encounters with the original series, I experienced some real menace and tension in the remake, with Fred's trademark wisecracks wisely toned down for atmosphere's sake. I can go on for days on end with comparisons, which favor the remake for me, or we can simply cut to the chase, as tackling three reviews in one evening has left me slightly burnt out at this point, by summarizing that most of the gripes of the Nightmare fan base towards this ninth installment comprise a lot of the reasons why I prefer it to the original, which I'd probably score roughly the same on the rating scale. For the silent minority out there, who grew to despise all things Freddy over the years, check this one out, you might end up feeling the same way about it as I do when all's said and done. Two wops.


" One, two...Kelly let the grounder roll through..."

"Bloody Birthday" (1981) d/ Ed Hunt

Anybody know if there was an eclipse on October 5th, 1969? The vein of earlier killer kiddie classics like Village of the Damned is well tapped in tonight's review,  from the director who sent Christopher Lee into the far reaches of outer space long before George Lucas did, with 1977's Starship Invasions. Watching this movie is like hitching a ride in Mr. Peabody's WABAC Machine for somebody like me who's somehow matured into a reasonable adult after a similar childhood to the demonic little scapegraces on the screen. If you happen to be from my old neighborhood during this era: Eff you, I cop to nothing. If deviously remorseless ten year old's ( portrayed by Billy Jacoby/Jayne (who's older bro Scott was Bad Ronald), Elizabeth Hoy, and Andrew Freeman, respectively) hunting down the likes of Susan Strasberg and Julie Brown like game animals in eighties gear doesn't appeal to you, then you're probably on the wrong website.


Remember MTV's two Julie Brown's? I always dug this one's wubba wubba wubba's over "Downtown" Julie's.
In 1970, three babies are born synchronous to a solar eclipse in California, with Saturn's astrological blockage leaving each child void of any real emotions or remorse. After nearly a decade has passed, we revisit the children as their tenth birthdays approach only to find that they've added insidious homicide to their play habits, as a young couple trying to enjoy cemetery sex soon find. Voyeurism is also a favorite, as we see Debbie earning pocket change by allowing Curtis and Steven (Wait, one's even named Steven? Spoooky.) to peep on her older sister, Beverly (Brown), as she mirror-dances with her buhhuhbas out. Timmy, a young peer, figures out the trio's propensity for wrongdoing after they lure him into a nearby junkyard and lock him in a discarded refrigerator. Debbie's father, the sheriff, is marked for a fatal accident on the steps, but when he steps over the strategically placed skateboard, Steven brains him with a baseball bat, instead. Their teacher, Ms. Davis (Strasberg) begins to catch on to their destructive vibe, but Curtis puts a slug in the woman's back in an empty classroom, for her interference.


"No, I don't know what a skull fracture feels like, honey, why do you ask?"
Timmy's older sister Joyce (Lori Lethin) suspects the kids, but at their collective birthday bash, they fool her into thinking they've laced the party cakes with ant poison(!!), thus, making her seem like the unhinged one to the whole neighborhood. When Beverly stumbles upon her little sister's scrapbook of newspaper clippings concerning their growing list of crimes(!!!), she eats ocular arrow-driven death for her nosiness. Finally, Debbie asks Joyce and Timmy to babysit her, an elaborate trap that fails, getting Curtis and Steven subdued for the police while the devious little girl manages to escape. At home, Debbie tearfully implicates her partners-in-crime to her mother. At the crime scene, we see Curtis shoot a disturbed look at his failed last victims from the back of a police cruiser as it pulls away. Elsewhere, we see Debbie's mother rehearsing her daughter's new alias with her, unaware that she's already dropped a car on a local auto mechanic nearby, killing him...


Take it from a former little bastard: These are little bastards.
You may remember Lethin from her genre work in fare like The Prey (1984) and 1987's Return to Horror High.When Julie Brown wasn't shaking her nude melons for ten year old boys, she was making funny music videos like "The Homecoming Queen's Got a Gun".At least, it seemed a lot funnier before antisocial water heads started shooting up schools on a regular basis. Still, there's always Earth Girls Are Easy (1988), right? If you're plum tuckered out by the vast number of by-the-numbers 80's slasher flicks out there, this one might just provide the spark to enliven your appreciation of the sub-genre, all over again. Three wops, and a recommendation, say I.


"C'mon, Julio, this is no time to fall asleep under the rear axle with preserves on your face..."