"Freddy vs. Jason" (2003) d/ Ronny Yu

Ironically, our final Friday the 13th review (until the day they decide to haphazardly throw another sequel/prequel/remake together, of course) also marks the first time we're covering Freddy Krueger here. If it's up to me, this will be the only time. Oh yeah, I'm fully aware just how many of you were weaned on and subsequently scared half to death by the corny one-liners and ugly sweater-fedora combo since Wes Craven's first successful series poo-step in 1984, it's just that I never was, thankfully. Even as a teenager watching the original, I felt insulted that they'd waste such an impressive m.o. on such an embarrassingly impotent-looking bad guy, horror's equivalent of Doctor Detroit (1984).
With the phoned in ending of Jason Goes to Hell:The Final Friday still cemented to the bottom of my breadbasket like a pound of grilled venison, I purposely avoided seeing this one on principle until finally, I snagged the dvd off of an A-Town Wal Mart shelf while rubbing elbows with the two a.m. shower cap and bedroom slippers crowd, it having finally been reduced in price to something that I no longer considered rape, and also constituting "something new"(post 70's), which my then concubine-of-the-moment constantly complained that I never indulged in, caustic little ball-breaker that she no doubt, was. What followed, was a decorous, campy effort from director Ronny Yu ( The Bride With White Hair, Bride of Chucky) that reminded me of an updated version of the old Universal monster battle flicks at times.

One, two...look at the bobblers on you.
Having been rendered powerless when the townspeople of Springwood forgot his horrible crimes over time, Freddy Krueger (Englund) enlists the homicidal services of  prolific Crystal Lake slasher Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger) to jog the town's collective memory, by posing as his mother and sending the silent giant off to punish the bad children of Elm Street, like Lori (Monica Keena) and her friends, who are having a sleepover. One of the boys gets butchered, leading the authorites to start throwing around the ol' capital F, capital K name again, which leads the kids to suddenly start having nightmares about Krueger again, but he finds himself too weak to actually snuff anyone in their dreams at this point. Jason, on the other hand, is more than willing to pick up Freddy's slack, murdering kids and parents alike, even hack-slashing his way through a cornfield rave while set ablaze, once again picking up Krueger's spare by stealing his intended victim. Lori and a handful of her friends escape in her ex-boyfriend's van, after he and his friend escape from a mental hospital where they've been kept, to warn her about the evil janitor's return.


When they say you ought not tear the law label off of the bottom of the mattress, they ain't whistlin' Dixie.
Freddy does in Mark(Brendan Fletcher) with his signature glove o' finger-knives as Will (Jason Ritter) and Lori watch helplessly, sending them rushing back to the psych ward for the Hypnocil script that kept them from dreaming while asleep. At the hospital, Freddy assumes the form of a hookah-smoking caterpillar and dives down Lori's stoner buddy's yap, possessing him to flush all the pills down the sink drain. Voorhees makes the scene, electrocuting a cop, before splitting the stoner down the middle as he pumps two syringes of the drug into the hulking killer, sending him into a prolonged catnap as the remaining kids rush him home to Crystal Lake for his final face-off with Freddy, who's already discovered Jason's fear of drowning (?) in the killer's subconscious, and is using it to great advantage against him, poking his finger-knives into Voorhees' hydrocephalic head, being an obnoxious dick, and whatnot. With Jason drowning in his sleep, Lori volunteers to enter the dream battle-scape herself to even the odds, and manages to pull both baddies into reality, where Freddy reveals that it wasn't the girl's father who killed her mother all those years ago...it was him all along! Cue: the epic final reel serial-killer-fu-on-wire fight to the finish you paid to see, and throw in your obligatory shabby disembodied Freddy-head wink at the camera, and that just about wraps it up...


Krueger-pillar, cater-killer, either or. Just pass that hookah.
Yu not only succeeds at making a relatively entertaining Friday the 13th/Nightmare on Elm Street mash up here, he uses just the right amount of Freddy to not piss me off and lose me before the end credits, which might be a trailer's worth for me? I dunno, but for some reason, I didn't mind the cheesy wisecracking and mugging for the camera the way I would normally have done. Definitely worth a look for the completist and the curious, but it probably won't end up among your all-time favorites. Not quite enjoyable enough to pass out Jason Lives (1986) or The Final Chapter (1984), but more than enough boobs, blood, and brawl to top garbage like Jason Takes Manhattan (1989) or Jason Goes to Hell (1993).Two wops.


"You couldn't find this machete?!!? It was buried in your lung the whole time, you boob!"

"Eaten Alive"(1976)d/Tobe Hooper

R.I.P. Arbogast on Film. Two years after giving the world nightmares with his brilliant cinematic portrait of a deranged family of unemployed cannibalistic cattle slaughterers, director Tobe Hooper served up tonight's entry as a sophomore effort, though not without some merit, it ultimately falls well short of its predecessor's dizzying levels of excellence.Hooper assembled an able cast of B-movie vets comprised of glorious villain Neville Brand, fresh off the success of the critically acclaimed 1974 telepic, Killdozer(okay, I'm kidding), Robert Englund(pre-cornball Freddy Krueger antics), Carolyn Jones(The Addams Family's Morticia in a late appearance), Kyle Richards, Mel Ferrer, Marilyn Burns, Roberta Collins, and Stuart Whitman to an atmospheric (and blatantly obvious)soundstage dressed to resemble an ominous backwoods fleabag motel on swamps that house an enormous African crocodile(also blatantly fake as nuts).Though tonight's feature, also known as 'Starlight Slaughter' and 'Death Trap' among other alternate titles, holds its own in the scare department, it also holds the dubious honor of being Hooper's follow up to TCM, perhaps accounting for audiences' tepid reception over the years.Despite a bigger budget than his previous effort, Eaten still has a phony 'television special' look about it that, for me, adds a certain stylish ambience to the formulaic blood n' boobs production that might turn other viewers off when they experience it.Don't let the fact that there are no screencaps of a shithouse rat-crazy Neville Brand waving a farmer's scythe around in the entry give you the wrong idea, his performance is incoherent mumbling lunacy that you oughta experience at least once in your life.Let's get to it... Clara(Roberta Collins) leaks some claret. Clara(Roberta Collins) is too prim and proper of a prostitute to let Buck(Robert Englund) access her back door, resulting in her madam, Miss Hattie(Carolyn Jones), showing her the front door, instead.Clara trudges through the woods to a dilapidated shack on the edge of the swamp that passes for the Starlight Hotel, as run by Judd(Neville Brand), a mumbling mental deficient with a wooden leg who's petting zoo is starving to death around him out of neglect(we watch a monkey give up the ghost inside its dirty cage).Once Judd identifies Clara as one of 'Miss Hattie's girls', he flips the fuck out and labonza-shanks her repeatedly with a pitchfork before chucking her remains over the porch railing to the waiting jaws of a huge African crocodile he keeps as a pet in the swamp behind the fence.Soon afterwards, a bickering, dysfunctional family and their pet dog pull up outside, in desperate need of lodging for the night, but Judd's croc swallows the pooch alive in front of the little girl's disbelieving eyes.After some heated arguing upstairs, the girl's father, Roy(William Finley), pledges to go out and shoot the croc(after mocking his daughter with pantomime dog barks and croc jaw snaps!), but Judd lays a righteous scythe upon him outside, and the croc, anxious for its next meal, smashes through the porch railing to snare the dying gent.Judd then interrupts the girl's mother, Faye(Marilyn Burns), who's about to enjoy a relaxing bath in the unkempt washroom, with a hearty ass-beating before tying her to a bed.Little Angie(Kyle Richards) manages to escape the clutches of the hotel's psycho gimp and hide quietly among the rats and creepy crawlies under the darkened porch. There is no joy for annoying Roy(William Finley), now resigned to be a croc's chew toy. Meanwhile, Harvey(Mel Ferrer) arrives on the scene with Libby in tow, seeking the whereabouts of his other daughter, Clara, when Judd points the inquisitive family members towards Miss Hattie's brothel, which they pay a fruitless visit to with the local sheriff(Stuart Whitman).Libby accompanies the sheriff to the local drinking establishment for a bite to eat before backtracking to the hotel, but their meal is interrupted by an anebriated Buck and his curvy arm decoration, Lynette(Janus Blythe), when a fight breaks out.Libby's father returns to the hotel and gets face-scythed after hearing the little girl under the porch crying for help.After the sheriff kicks the couple out, they pay the Starlight a visit, but when Buck hears Angie's whimpers and cries from under the porch, he goes out to investigate and gets pushed into the murky drink by Judd, who watches as his croc feeds once again.Lynette eludes the proprietor's scythe of judgment, and escapes into the woods, managing to flag down a passing car in the nick of time.Libby returns to discover Faye gagged and bound to the bed and frees her while Judd is busy opening the gate downstairs to allow his crocodile access to its next prepubescent meal under the place.Faye and Libby make a break for it but get chased back upstairs by a howling, scythe-wielding Judd, who wounds Faye with the farming tool and throws her off the balcony.Meanwhile, Libby has helped Angie to get out of the swamp, and when Judd tries to push her back in, he gets flipped in himself by Faye, who watches as the hillbilly's homicidal pet clamps down on the final victim of the evening, and a prosthetic leg floats to the surface.Roll credits. So glad you decided to stay, Faye(Marilyn Burns). Brand would later turn up in Without Warning(1980), and Evils of the Night(1985).Janus Blythe, who looks especially backwoods-delectable here, would next appear in Wes Craven's cult classic, The Hills Have Eyes(1977), as the memorable Ruby character.Englund, another favorite, is entertaining to watch, long before being typecast as a supernatural burn-scarred serial killer who spouts corny one-liners as he pops out of your dreams.Jones would only act in one more movie, doing some television work before succumbing to cancer in 1983.Exploitation staple, Roberta Collins went on to appear in things like Whiskey Mountain(1977), Saturday the 14th(1981), and Death Wish II(1982).Marilyn Burns, always luscious lens candy in every role, doesn't purvey fear as intensely here, as opposed to TCM.There I go, making that inevitable, unfair comparison again.I really don't think this one's as bad as some folks would have you believe; what it is, is standard stalk 'em n' kill 'em fare, an average follow up to a masterpiece, which only further pales it in comparison and detracts from its overall popularity.As such, two Wops sounds about right when laying down the verdict from the glorious scale.Worth a look. Plucked from a righteous jailbait date, Buck(Robert Englund), out of luck, gets (proper)fucked.

"Galaxy of Terror"(1981)d/Bruce D. Clark

Dio scapa da letto senza gambe!The weather's like your family favorite,overachieving dork cousin out there,pals o' mine,no matter how much time you spend with it,it never seems to get any cooler.That one,like my last live-in girlfriend,was cheap and easy.I'm planning on partying it up a little bit once the sun goes down,but I wanted to throw a new review up for you guys beforehand.I've been dragging ass the past couple of days,the heat's got me moving slower than the second reel of "A Clockwork Orange"(1971) over here.All truth.Current humidity-based lethargy aside,we're on ched to surpass all three previous years at the Wop in review volume regardless,so go easy on me,you ass-slap happy bastiges.I did the rural Pennsyltucky amusement park thing the other day,and if I had a dime for every semi-nude overdeveloped teenage girl with dirty feet I saw,I'd be breaking open a brand spankin' new carton o' smokes right about now.I'm happy to report we've recently moved up to the number three spot for exploitation movies on networked blogs,tanto meglio e molto grazie a tutti dei miei "woprophile" amici,abbracciandoti e baciandoti caramente!E' figo.Vieni con me,non e' vero?
The colorful,eye catching one-sheet for tonight's entry hung in my room for quite a while back in the eighties after seeing it at the Gateway Twin Cinema in '81,and when someone'd ask about the movie it represented,I'd exclaim,matter-of-factly:"You're looking at the best part of it." which is really speaking volumes,because the two hardest things to do in 1981,in no particular order,were:squeezing your ass into Sergio Valente jeans then evening the giant cuffs at the bottom,and convincing an eleven year old me that there was a such thing as a bad horror movie.I'd just never buy it.I'd defend any horror movie,regardless of how bad it was,to anybody.But even that younger version of me would still tell you that this one sucks.As years went by,the one-sheet came down off my wall,and the movie disappeared from my memory,for the most part.Then,inexplicably,I started romanticizing about it,forgetting what my old man had said as he walked outta the theater with me("That was STUPID!And CHEAP!")and wanting to see it again,recalling an impressive cast of B-movie staples like Erin "Happy Days" Moran,Sid Haig,Edward Albert,Robert Englund,and Ray "My Favorite Martian" Walston,and something about a giant space maggot raping a pillow-chested broad and sliming her to death.As the VHS era had long since passed,and I had dumped thousands upon thousands of video tapes,and since tonight's review had been surpassed for dvd release to that point,I scored myself a bootleg,and got comfy on the couch with two packs of smokes and ample AMP energy drinks,ready to rediscover what I had convinced myself was a "lost gem"...

Alluma(Moran) is psi-sensitive.Mean nothing to you?Don't sweat it,it means nothing to the plot,either.
The spaceship Quest is sent to the far-off planet of Morganthus by a gent called the Planet Master,who's sort of like the Dungeon Master except his head is a glowing red ball of light instead of greasy hair,coke bottle glasses,and zits the size of golf balls,to investigate a recent crash and search for stranded castaways.Aboard the Quest,Captain Trantor(Grace Zabriskie),the lone survivor of a historic disaster which has her entire crew wary of her piloting skills,puts their minds at ease with roughly thirty seconds to prepare for her several dangerously risky hyperspace jumps to the planet,culminating in a crash landing next to the ship they were sent to look for in the first place.See?She was the right woman for the job,afterall.After some limp in-fighting,the crew sends a surface team out consisting of Quuhod(Haig),who has a hard on for crystal throwing stars,Alluma(Moran),who is psi-sensitive and the main love interest of Cabren(Albert),the ship's official porn stache,Cook(Walston),who is...yeah,the ship's cook,Baelon(Zalman King),Ranger(Englund),the ship's high-strung engineering officer who loves to argue,Damiela(Taaffe O'Connell),the blonde with big tits who's afraid of worms,Commander Ilva,and Private Cos,the intergalactic reboot of Don Knott's Mr. Chicken.Upon finding the corpses of the former crew,the quick-thinking,hair-triggered team incinerates them immediately with laser fire.Thinking nothing of it,they return to their ship,leaving Cos behind to have his brain chewed upon by a stop motion insect-thing of palpable low budgeted origins.

Robert Englund,pre-cheesy glove knives,holding a cheesy prop laser pistol instead.
The crew sets out again to locate the rootage of the distress call,this time investigating the giant alien pyramid a few hundred feet away.Ilva,overwhelmed by his duties,hands command over to Baelon,and is then sucked dry by retractable rubber hand puppets.Quuhod uses his crystals to gain entrance to the pyramid,but is emotionally devastated when they break,and even more so when a shard flies into his arm,causing him to sever it before it does any more damage,failing stoutheartedly when that severed arm plants a crystal into his chest.Damiela stumbles upon Quuhod's corpse,teaming with maggots only moments later,and incinerates it according to ship protocol,only one little writhing critter escapes the flame,only to grow to enormous size,and tear off all her gear with its slime-soaked mandibles and hump her to death,coating those sweater puppies with ooze and leaving her slimy,naked corpse very dead,and apparently,well satisfied.The captain manages to cook herself alive like a Christmas ham,Baelon gets dispatched by a lackluster rubbery beastie,and Alluma gets squeezed by disappointingly non-rape minded tentacles that cause her head to explode(wouldn't you have loved to see that on Happy Days?Fonzie:"Whooooaaa,Shortcake's head just exploded,Mr. C!Conference in my office.")leaving Ranger and Cabren to realize that its the crew's own inborn fears that are killing them.So...what's the scientific term for fear of being raped to death by giant space maggots again?Cabren faces off against the Planet Master,who's doffed off his Ray Walston cook disguise,and slipped into his more comfortable red glowing head,and informs the 'stache that the pyramid was a toy for the minds of ancient race's children to overcome their fears.Cabren kills the Master for wiping out his crew,thus replacing him as the new Planet Master,his moustache forever obscured by a nifty red glowing head.

"Baby,that's it!Stroke my laterohypopharyngeal organ,you filthy little minx!"
It took me several days to gather my thoughts on this production,and it'll probably take you twice as long to sit through the damned thing.This would be the second film James Cameron worked on,as production designer and second unit director,and it's been said the infamous space maggot rape scene was handled by Jimbo himself.Gotta give the guy credit for that,at least.That's not something very many filmmakers can throw on a resume,right?Another tasty bit of useless trivia concerning Galaxy,is that no less than four members of the principal cast has appeared in different incarnations of Star Trek,with Haig actually appearing on the original series itself.I'm sure all of them would agree that this was a budgetary step downwards from then.This would also mark the last film Clark would direct,after helming genre fare like Hammer prior to in the seventies,giving rise to the question,how much of a talentless hack behind the camera lens do you have to be before the likes of Roger Corman sends you curbward?Once you've sit through Galaxy,the answer will make itself apparent to you.The film met with ratings board resistance early on,facing an X rating if it didn't greatly expurgate the infamous horny foodworm scene(it was all there in the theater),though later prints would restore the scene in its entirety.Besides the rubbery special effects,it must be noted that the script also fucking sucks and is brutally lazy,where every character's lines are bereaft of personality save for some bickering and whining,all of which is delivered lifelessly,of course.Corman could have had himself a medicore Alien-rip off on his hands,but the finished product falls well flat of even that grade curve.The only positives I could cull from the whole experience are the aforementioned fly larva-fuck scene,and as inept and boring as it stands,at least it isn't Inseminoid(1981).Rubbery monster hands emerge from openings on a familiar set used on two or three other movies previously, and slap a mere single wop across your face.As my father said that day in 1981,"That was STUPID!And CHEAP!".Father knows best.

He was about to facepalm himself for signing on to do this yawnapalooza,but a rubber hand beat him to it.