"Baskin" (2015) d/ Can Evrenol

Remember when the Republic of Turkey was renowned for cinematic excellence the world over, and film fans could hardly wait to see what spectacle the Turkish lens fell upon next? Yeah, me neither. I do however recall the nation that brought us such unforgettably rotten gems as Dunyayi Kurtaran Adam aka/ Turkish Star Wars (1982),  Seytan aka/ Turkish Exorcist (1974), and Badi aka/ Turkish E.T. (1983). Naturally when the internet buzzed concerning director Can Evrenol's Baskin I was mildly skeptical, to say the least. Still, I approached tonight's review with open eyes and a similarly receptive mind. Read on, woprophiles, for my synopsis and verdict, if you dare...


Carnivorous since birth, I confess that I wouldn't mind taking a healthy bite out of this after some extensive flame broiling.
A group of Turkish cops bet on football and discuss the finer points of zoophilia and chick-with-dick-tricks at an out-of-the-way restaurant (translation: plywood Akcaabat meatball shack) where they bully paying customers for laughing at their outrageous stories, ending in one cop left screaming in a reflexive mirror wig out, when they're called to another even more out-of-the-way location as back up to another squad. Who's driving? The officer who's just experienced the breakdown, of course. The fellows belt out a Turkish pop song with the radio before naked men run across the road, and the ride is ultimately cut short when the vehicle barrels into someone standing in the middle of the asphalt in the darkness.There's a lot of frogs, too, for a reason unbeknownst to your humble narrator. On foot, they encounter some creepy gypos in a camp (One particularly acromegalous one is a frog hunting giant) before arriving at the abandoned police station that is the source of their call, another squad vehicle parked outside with the engine running and lights flashing. Not a good sign, as Nancy Loomis used to say...


Hugh Jackman, eat your heart out, buddy.
Upon entering the building, they find a fellow officer slamming his dome piece repeatedly into a wall, mostly covered in ominous Satanic-looking graffiti and decorated with weird stuff hanging from strings, a la Blair Witch. Naturally, they've stumbled onto a black mass of sorts, with throngs of folks wrapped in clear plastic, cheap animal masks, and whatnot. The cops are overpowered before too long, and end up bound to the ceiling, and awaiting judgment in H-E-double hockey sticks, which is overseen by the Turkish equivalent of a member of Slipknot, and ultimately, a little rubber-faced creep with long nails, known as Baba or "The Father"(Mehmet Cerrahoglu), a cruel and unusual cat who grooves on disemboweling motherfuckers with his fingernails, poking dude's eyes out with a knife to strains of Riz Ortolani's Cannibal Holocaust soundtrack, and simply sawing open fella's throats and rubbing the free-spilling blood all over his chrome dome. One cop is forced to knock at the back door of a chunky woman in an animal mask and plastic sheet ensemble, on all fours. In the end, the easy way out is chosen to wrap up the clumsy, hole-ridden narrative, and you'll see it coming.


In Hell, there's sex at it's unsexiest.
On a positive note, some of the cinematography is effective, and the torture porn-level gore is passable if slightly pedestrian, but neither aspect really compensates for the lack of story or budgetary confinements that the film is anchored by. Another deficiency I feel I have to mention, is the lack of sympathetic characters here, as all protagonist parties involved in the cinematic Hellride I neither rooted for nor against throughout the running time. The same goes for the Hellions.  In fact, I kind of dozed off halfway through on my first attempt to watch, being forced to cue it up a second time, on Netflix, which I applaud for listing such an unusual title so that I never have to waste money on a hard copy in the future. My shelving space is precious, and there's little chance that tonight's film ever occupies it. One Wop.


"All of teh preserves is belongs to me, plix!"

"The Sentinel" (1977) d/Michael Winner

Brooklyn residents nowadays will tell you: Hell isn't underneath one of it's brownstones, it's affording the rent for one. Still, you have to admire the originality and intelligence of the premise of tonight's feature, a well creepy little flick from the guy who brought you 'Death Wish'(1974). I remember the tv spot for this one giving me the creeps at the time, and that creepy vibe only carried over into the Jeffrey Konvitz novel (with the cool open-up cover) that my old man brought me home afterwards. Come to think of it, the whole damned affair is a memorably unpleasant experience, but in this genre, that's a compliment, isn't it. There's an all-star cast along for the ride, too, with names like Burgess Meredith, Jose Ferrer, Martin Balsam, Ava Gardner, and Arthur Kennedy topping the list, a soundtrack by Gil "Night Gallery" Melle, and one or two seriously painful-looking effects from the maestro himself, Dick Smith.


"I no care about Burgess Meredith. You sed there wud be cheezburgrs I can haz..."
Alison Parker (Cristina Raines) is a troubled model/actress who's just moved into one of New York's historic brownstones, below an elderly reclusive priest named Halliran (John Carradine) who sits in front of his top floor window like a blind, arthritic piece of furniture, at all times. Then there's kindly old Mr. Chazen (Burgess Meredith) who holds birthday parties for his cat, Jezebel (that's odd, cat people, you can't tell me it isn't!), and a pair of oversexed lesbians named Gerda and Sandra (Sylvia Miles, Beverly D'Angelo)...Or so it would seem. Meanwhile, her clingy lawyer beau, Michael (Chris Sarandon), is getting hassled by a local detective (Eli Wallach) who's not so convinced that he wasn't involved in his ex-wife's death. Alison starts suffering from insomnia, compounded by horrifying memories of interrupting her father and two hookers during a food fetish ménage à trois involving cake (!), and her prior two failed suicide 
attempts. The noisy oddball neighbors lead the troubled girl to take matters up with her new 
landlord,  Miss Logan (Eva Gardner), who informs her that, besides the blind priest on the top floor, she is alone in the building!!!  Cue: creepy 50's theremin here.


In a kid-free environment, Ellen Griswold shoots sexy catcher signals at Clark.
...turns out the building is situated atop the gates of Hell afterall (I'd be after a rent rebate, personally, but that's just me) and owned by a secret order of excommunicated Catholic priests, from which one is chosen to rectify his mortal sins by becoming the overseer and guardian, protecting the portal from any stray demons with designs on entering our realm of existence and it just so happens that our heroine's failed suicides make her the perfect candidate to replace ol' Halliran upstairs. She squares off against Chazen, who reveals his true evil nature, and a gaggle of lost souls (translation: actual deformed circus freaks) that includes her murdered boyfriend Michael, who had been damned for all eternity for offing his spouse. Chazen offers her a blade to finish herself off, and avoid all the unnecessary responsibility, but she chooses to relieve Monsignor Franchino (Arthur Kennedy, as an Italian, really??) and Halliran of a large burdensome cross and take her place in the window seat, instead. After the brownstone is demolished and replaced with a new apartment building, we see Miss Logan showing a young couple the place. When they ask about neighbors, she tells of only two: a violinist, and an old blind nun on the top floor...

 
You should think about exchanging your reading glasses for a monocle, pal.
Even if the controversial finale of tonight's review isn't your gruesome cup o'tea, you have to admit it was more interesting than Won Ton Ton: The Dog That Saved Hollywood, director Winner's effort from the previous year. Nearly as many celeb cameos as that flick, too, when I think about it. Wallach, Berenger, Walken, Goldblum,  Orbach, D'Angelo...even a post-Jaws Richard freakin' Dreyfuss, ferchrissakes. I'd need  a separate post altogether just to tag 'em all. By no means anything exceptional here, but an enjoyably moody old school good time, none-the-less. Two big ones.
 

Blinded by the light, he was revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night.
 

"Midnight"(1982)d/John Russo

I'm willing to forgive NOTLD co-writer John Russo for the folly of much of his cinematic output since his famous collaboration with George A., with special emphasis on his mordacious handling of the so-called 30th Anniversary recut, rescored, (retarded) re-imagining of the b&w Romero zombie classic.Instead, tonight we'll take a look the 1982 film version of his novel, first published in 1980, a mostly uncoordinated, slow moving, minor effort, with occasional moments of eerie backwoods atmosphere and amateur splatter.Working with a skeleton crew, light-damaged cheapo film stock, and mostly unreliable amateur actors, while the cut-happy MPAA censors neutered his horrific theological vision, Russo still manages to insert some quality unease into his directorial debut, sort of a TCM meets Deranged vibe going on here.Until the advent of dvds, most of Midnight's juicy bits ended up on the cutting room floor, with the craptastic Vidmark VHS release from the early eighties still stale on my mind, though Arrow's transfer looks to be an equally murky dub from weathered video source materials(as evidenced by the time coding at the top of some of my screenshots, eh).Apart from Lawrence Tierney and John Amplas, the cast, garbed in what looks like a  J.C. Penny's sidewalk sale run on 1978 backstocked polyester and denim, is mostly forgettable, though antagonists David Marchick, Greg Besnak, and Robin Walsh run the gamut from gleefully sadistic to stiltedly comical as the family of hayseed Satanists.Melanie Verlin as the female lead is neither effective nor particularly swell to look at, for that matter.The headache-inducing AM Gold-esque synth score that perfectly accentuates the disco wear and shag carpeted van interiors within, if you see where I'm goin' here. Russo delights in padding out already snore-worthy driving and walking sequences throughout the movie, still, there's that foreboding dread, sporadic as it may be, that rises out of his frame that's rare for slashers of the era.You could do a lot worse than a movie like this on a Wednesday night, I guess.

Five words no girl ever wants to hear: "Come to Lawrence Tierney, baby..."
We see what looks to be Jimmy Peterson's little sister screaming her fool head off while snagged in an animal trap, before Momma(Jackie Nicoll)  can convince her brood that the terrified girl is really a demon in disguise, and in desperate need of a hearty clobberin' with an axe handle.Back at the farmhouse, we see the girl sacrificed to the dark lord and master with a single plunge of a sizeable dagger, as wielded by Cynthia(Debra Smith) .Over the credits, it gets even more diabolical, as Nancy Johnson(Melanie Verlin) gives a juicy confession(she's committed sins o' th' flaish with her boyfriend...wait, chicks that looked like the leisure version of Prince Valiant got laid in the early eighties? It can't be.) and is told she oughta be burning in Hell for sharing her cunt before marriage the way she's done, by cracky!At home, it might even be worse for the old looking teen, who's drunkenly ogled and groped by her own stepdad(Lawrence Tierney) before braining him with a transistor radio(!) and thumbing her way outta town before he comes to, and she has to hear him say, "Why don't ya just relax and let Daddy make ya feel good?" again.To strains of easy listening AM radio'd be too embarrassed to play, Nancy hops in a shagged out delivery van on it's way to Fla, as piloted by a checkered pair of squares, Tom and Hank, and together, they embark on a corny driving montage complete with racial tensions in a saloon, and a black preacher at a gas station who's barely able to spit out some exposition about missing locals, gas cans, and anti-black sentiment in the area before a yokel can bark at him.The priest gets knifed up in a nearby graveyard and his daughter gets C.T.F.O.ed in the tub by a snickering mountain of a good ol' boy while our heroes steal groceries, netting them anti-climactic cop chase that lands them directly in the center of fucking nowhere.Meanwhile, back home, Nancy's stepdad breaks it to Mom that she's been showing off her little body to him whenever she gets the chance, and he's kept it from her out of love.Larry Tierney a sex magnet?Now I've seen it all...

If you give tonsilectomies with a rusty machete in a rundown farmhouse, you might be a redneck.
Our gang awakens from their camping overnighter with gun barrels in their faces the next morning, courtesy of Abraham(John Amplas) and Luke(Greg Besnak), dressed as cops.Hank, cuffed, makes a break for it, and pays with a point blank execution headshot from Abe, who later plugs Tom in the heart, savin' taxpayers money an' all.The trigger-happy badges chase Nancy through the woods to a farmhouse where Cynthia(Robin Walsh) deals Solitaire while her brother Cyrus(David Marchick) gigglingly saws off a victim's head with a machete.Why, these are the same evil brats from the pre-credit sequence, all grown up and twice as psychotic.I see what you did there.The siblings squabble about having three sacrifices to Satan for Easter(I was unaware Satan even celebrated beyond your obligatory basket full of chocolate bunnies and eggs like the rest of us) while Nancy gets cozy in a dog cage, next to Gwen, another kenneled up cutie for the festivities.The boys burn the burgeoning pile of bodies and snatch another shapely young victim while Luke shanks up her husband in a nearby woodpile, following up on the promise he'd made earlier to his mother's mummified corpse in the attic.The first girl gets herself an extra mouth during the pentagram-heavy ceremony,  her blood caught in a chalice and fed to the siblings' mother's rotting cadaver while Nancy quietly gives an act of contrition from her cage.While the boys make Tom's van disappear, they're spotted by Burt, Nancy's stepdad, who's on the case like Kojak, if Kojak was an uglier, heavier drunk who fancied molesting his own stepdaughter, that is.Burt flashlights the shit outta Luke's domepiece and holds Cyrus and Abe at gunpoint, demanding they return his blow up do-uhhh, daughter, to him.In the melee, Cynthia jabs Burt with her dagger, Burt shoots Cyrus in the head, Nancy scythes Cynthia's throat, and later sets a resurrected Luke ablaze with a gas can and a match in the barn.Abe is dead somewhere too, I think.Cue that rotten title track one last time, thankfully, and let's recoup our losses already.

With her hair and makeup done, Mama was finally ready for the family photo at Sears.
Russo would follow tonight's review up with things like Midnight 2: Sex, Death and Videotape(1993), the direct-to-video sequel, Scream Queens' Naked Christmas(1996), and Santa Claws(1996), while chisel-faced Brooklyn tough guy Lawrence Tierney would  appear in genre offerings like 1987's The Offspring, The Prowler(1981), Chris Gore's Red(1992), The Horror Show(1989), and even that Tarantino cat's own debut, Reservoir Dogs(1992), as Joe 'Mr. Big' Cabot.Juicy.Real juicy, Junior.John Amplas, an always likable  Romero regular and favorite of mine, starred in Martin(1976), got shot off a rooftop in Dawn of the Dead(1978), played a mime in Knightriders(1981), rose from the grave in Creepshow(1982), and donned a lab coat in Day of the Dead(1985).While we're on the subject, Verlin would turn up in Romero's Monkey Shines(1988).Savini would stay busy throughout the decade, lending his effects wizardry to productions like Friday the 13th:The Final Chapter(1984), Creepshow 2(1987), and the 1990 Argento/Romero film, Due occhi diabolici, while appearing in direct-to-video titles like United's The Ripper(1985), which we'll be taking a gander at in the days to come.Despite Savini's credit for providing makeups and effects for tonight's feature, in the Arrow dvd featurette, "“Midnight at your Door: The Shocking Sacrifices of John A. Russo”, we hear the writer/director admit to fabricating much of the film's stabbing/slashing effects himself, even taking a potshot at Savini for his work on the mummified corpse in the finale.Also noteworthy, is Bill Hinzman, NOTLD's legendary 'Cemetery Zombie', who provided still photography for the movie.A technical dud, but worth a look, regardless.One Wop.

Nancy(Melanie Verlin)'s refusal to go on the paper lands her in the 'Punishment Kennel'.

"La Setta"(1991)d/Michele Soavi

As the resident uber-Italian on the block, I draw the most satisfaction from reviewing my fellow countrymen and their genre efforts here for your entertainment.Nothing exhilarates me more than a good horror movie, except maybe a good Italian horror movie, of course.Tonight,we'll cover a beautifully ominous and enigmatic example from my favorite of these aforementioned directors, fellow Milanese, Michele Soavi, that happens to star eighties scream screen Jamie Lee Curtis' older sister, Kelly, as well as genre legend Herbert Lom in one of his winter years appearances, and Soavi regular Tomas Arana in a splendid turn as a Manson-esque mass murdering Satanist.Also on board for the nether-born chaos and carnality (filmed over three months in 1990 for roughly two million dollars) are Donald(Dr. Butcher,M.D./Zombi Holocaust)O'Brien, Mariangela Giordano, and the legendary cult hero, Giovanni Lombardo Radice in a memorable cameo sequence, proving he may be the best at portraying an off-kilter kook on camera.Even Soavi himself turns up in an uncredited cameo as a magician on television.The effects were, of course handled by maestro, Sergio Stivaletti(some of the oddest work I've seen from him to date); with original sountrack work handled by none other than Pino Donaggio.
From the initial frames the viewer instantly knows it's a Soavi movie, due to the highly stylish trademark cinematography within, engulfing the film in a dream-like aura, making one wonder if he or she wasn't in the middle of an elaborately strange yet beautiful nightmare; a nod of influence to producer and co-writer Dario Argento perhaps, perhaps due in part to the surreal quality of the odd story itself.I haven't seen too many people champion Setta, as should definitely be the case here, but I blame that upon lack of exposure to many genre fans, and not a general dislike for the movie.I suspect that the pedestrian U.S. release title,"The Devil's Daughter" and the uninspiring Italian region 2 dvd sleeve artwork(Kelly Curtis holding a constrictor superimposed over some tinted energy lightning.Scared yet?Nah, me neither.More horrible than horrifying.) haven't helped win many viewers over either.A screening will have the opposite effect, revealing a murky,atmospheric,and often very spooky experience if you're willing to accept it.Highly recommended.

What Martin Romero(Johnny Morghen) lacks in hair follicles, he makes up for with batshit craziness.
We open in the desert with a commune full of sixties reject hippie dirt merchants doing what they do best, getting their tits painted and neglecting their kids, until they're finally set upon by a murderous cell of Satanic bikers, led by Damon(Tomas Arana) who's like Charlie Manson with better taste in music(he quotes the Rolling Stones, not the Beatles).Thankfully they slaughter the whole camp like groovy peacenik piggies,with Damon pow-wowing about a devil-driven apocalypse with unseen passengers in an ominous black limousine afterwards.It's not time, just yet.We spring ahead decades later to the nineties in Germany, where Martin Romero(get it?)(Johnny Morghen) is driven by unhallowed motives and impious forces to stalk and kill a woman, before a subway pickpocket unwittingly lifts a disembodied human heart from his pocket(Bobby Rhodes Demoni voice:"That'll teach ya to steal thangs!"), leading him to kill himself with an officer's revolver rather than be arrested for his heinous crime.Meanwhile a grizzled, feculent methuselah(Always wanted to call somebody that FTR) named Moebius(Herbert Lom)rides a cross-country bus, clutching a mysterious package and intermittently dosing his peepers with some horrible dark liquid.During a pitstop he is walloped to the asphalt by a car driven by a woman named Mirium(Kelly Curtis).He refuses the obligatory ride to the hospital, opting instead to recharge his creepy batteries on her couch for the night.A bad move on her part, unless she was looking for the elderly stranger to sneak into her room during the night and allow an earwig-esque insect of unknown origin crawl up one of her nostrils and exiting Stage Well-in-the-cellar, which I probably don't think was the case...A simple "Heyyy,thanks for letting me crash at your place, baby." would have been closer to proper etiquette here.

Jovny the Vlasic stork delivers a diabolical pickle from Hell.
Before too long, Moebius' true intentions for the attractive young school teacher become known, camoflaged against a haze of deliriously wild dream imagery like a television watching bunny(...yes,bunny) that even channel surfs with the remote, an amorous stork(...yes,stork) with a propensity for rape and pecking mealworms out a beak-created meathole in a human neck, faces peeled off n' jacked up with the aid of multiple surgical finger-hooks, origin-free blue stringy residue in glasses of drinking water, evil animate hankies that form-fit into death masks(Sam Raimi was watching, no doubt) on the grillpiece of Miriam's friend and fellow schoolteacher Kathryn(Mariangela Giordano,of "Burial Ground" fame), and irrational giallo-styled stabbings: He is the elder of a sinister sect that has targeted Miriam as the life-vessel to carry the hell-seed to bear the son of the dark lord and master, Satan himself, triggering the Astarothical armageddon that Damon was plugging for in the first reel, enslaving the doomed human race.This all should have become painfully apparent when she discovered the Carollian portal to Hell in her basement.She probably might have wanted to check for that when she bought the house in the first place, I dunno.Does Ol' Scratch get the opportunity to hand out brimstone-flavoured "It's a boy" cigars? I'll let you snare a copy and find out what happens at the climax for yourselves.You'll dig it.

...On the receiving end of what's known in the industry as a "reverse Joan Rivers".
As far as I know, no NTSC dvd has been released for tonight's review as of yet; I rushed out and grabbed the Italian disc with all speed ages ago, and it perplexes the writhing screw out of me to see genre fans whimpering about paying twenty-two dollars for a dvd(I paid more than that, ya petticoats!), let alone one by a masterful director such as Soavi that they've more than likely yet to see, yet box packages of Peter Jackson's Rings trilogy(they've likely seen a dozen times already) go for upwards of eighty bucks(...an expensive hobbit indeed.Sorry.),and spend weeks on the best seller list with no backlash.Prioritize intelligently, is what I'm saying here, woprophiles mine.
A visually stunning and bizarre progression from his previous two genre pieces,Stagefright(1987)and La Chiesa(1989),Setta, which was also puzzlingly marketed to some extent as Demons 4(with Chiesa serving as Demons 3), is an expert honing of Soavi's directorial blade, which would be held aloft over all(at least according to ol' Wop's standards anyway) by the time of his next film,Dellamorte Dellamore(1994), his last horror film to date.I've seen hardline Argentophiles rip on Soavi for this movie's Dario-esque feel, even going so far as to call him a hack because of it.Climb out of Argento's ass already, ye blind sycophants, and conserve your venom for more deserving Italo-cinema failures,like Trauma(1993) or Phantom of the Opera(1998).Pssst, that's two more asspies than Michele has ever helmed.Soavi rules.Three wops.

Put that groady external womb-bag away, would you? Can't take you anyplace.

"Satan's Children"(1974)d/Joe Wiezycki

May the Ancient Ones joyously rend the bastards over at Something Weird Video limb from limb for uncovering such a strange and wonderous lost regional drive in piece of seventies shit as tonight's entry, kiddies.I love you SW guys, seriously.Don't let the $38.50 budget fool you, this is one twisted flick, indeed.For a movie that's brave enough to bring to light Satan's(or the filmmakers?) inherent hatred of queers, there sure seems to be a lot of repressed underpantsin' going on here.Shot on a shoestring in Gibsonton,Florida(don't most of the country's sideshow people own a big trailer park down there?and didn't Lobster Boy get popped in that same trailer court in the nineties?) by Wiezycki, a Tampa television director with a burning desire to make real movies.I haven't had a chance to catch his one earlier film,a blaxploitation flick, so I can't say whether or not he ever succeeded in doing so.I'm laying my money on "Fuck,no."...at least until his movie landed under the woproscope here at the Wop!Lead actor(?) Stephen White looks like what you might get if you smashed Gary Oldman and Danny Bonaduce together and then sprinkled the result with homo powder and put it in tighty whiteys for three days worth of shooting.If you think his sexual orientation is foggy, wait 'til you see the local gay-hating Satanists.The whole thing feels like it's a frame away from turning into some skeevy seventies gay porn, which it thankfully never does, still managing to maintain a creepy enough "groovy communal atmosphere" to keep viewers interested until the ghetto-assed final credits roll.

You'll be lucky to get a pinky's worth with a head like that, sister.
After some credits roll over a bogus-assed drawing of the dark lord and master the film's producers must've snagged off my fifth grade art teacher,we're introduced to effeminate teen, Bobby Douglas(Stephen White), who has it real rough, man.He's got like, yardwork and chores to complete before he can groove in his room to tunes under the influence of some shwaggity dirt weed.It doesn't help that his ballbusting fuckfaced sister Janis(Joyce Molloy...who am I kidding,none of these names were ever uttered again in film)takes potshots at his manhood and waves her panty purse in his face every chance she gets.After some dinner table foot-crotchin' backfires, she sings to pop about Bobby's funny bag of tobacco he's got stashed, forcing him to blow the clambake or forfeit his nugs to dad.He wisely splits the scene, but not before telling his father to "Go to Jesus H. Christ Hell!", a place most foul, indeed.At a local bar, Bobby barely avoids the lecherous advances of a lonely old queer, only to end up naked and hog tied in the back seat of a car full of homo hillbillies who gang rape him and leave him for dead on the side of the road.Luckily for him, his punched out carcass is discovered the next day by some nearby Satanists awkwardly huddled together and playing Keep Away with a volleyball.Yeah, that's what I said.Interim cult head,Sherry takes a shine to the abused boy amidst dissent from her fellow lispy Satanists who claim that the Devil has no time for queers and losers.Sherry also strings up a female cultist in her drawers for having lesbian desires.Okay, so these guys are Straight-anists.

Now that's what these creeps call a Saturday night mobile ass party.Deliverance on wheels.
By the time Simon, the actual moustachioed leader returns to the compound(from cleaning out Sears of its backstock of the fall men's line for 1973, seemingly), some of his people have been hanged for treason(praying for Simon's return to what looks like a State Fair stuffed animal version of Baphomet,sewn together by dirty kids in a Singapore sweatshop, hanging on a wall), forcing him to have Sherry buried up to her head outside and covered with honey so that the ants will feast on her flesh.Eventually.You've got enough time to run to the concession stand for that Nardone's pizza and fries you've been crying about since the intermission, relax.Bobby escapes the enclosure in his tighty whiteys and flees the devil worshippers into the swamp.One cultist fries himself on an electrified fence(off-camera,you kiddin' me?)and two other of Simon's thugs drown in a dug out pool of about one hundred fifty dollars worth of oatmeal.I mean, quicksand, of course.He makes it back to the homestead to brain his old man with a bottle, score with his own sister, tying her up and throwing her in the trunk of a car, while he drives back to the scene of his earlier rape, serving up buckshot justice to the over-zealous fruits and sawing their heads off(off-camera,c'mon!).He saunters back to the Satanists with a sack full of severed heads to show Simon, who no longer doubts the boy's sexuality or nature.The cultists nail Janis to a cross and hoist her into the air, while performing groovy rituals all around her.Bobby takes the horse-mouthed Sherry to bed for some more awkward-looking, forced kisses. Hail Satan!

Drain the stage blood from the animal-shaped papier mache bags for the ritual!
Kudos to SWV for unearthing such a weird,little flick, released on a special edition double feature dvd with site fave William Girdler's first effort,"Asylum of Satan", which we'll no doubt be looking at in the future here.Though Children is certainly not good by anyone's standards, I think it's undeserving of the negative tags for the film's supposed anti-gay slant I've seen a lot of knee jerk 'netters pin on it thus far.So yeah,Gibsonton,you're not only the winter getaway for sideshow performers, you're also the birthplace of tonight's movie.You might wanna work on some new tourism draws one of these days, as much as I'd love to check you out sometime.I may not be one of your Ectrodactyly-afflicted, pincer-having rascals, but they say great physical beauty can be a flaw, as well, you know.One wop.

Weep not,my children.She was crucified by a hatchet face long before they hammered her up.

"The Devil's Rain"(1975)d/Robert Fuest

Okay,dig this scenario,boys:You've got Robert "Dr.Phibes" Fuest directing a satanic cult-based horror movie,which has Anton LaVey on board as a technical advisor,a cast that includes Ernest Borgnine,William Shatner,Ida Lupino,Eddie Albert,Tom Skerritt,and an eyeless Vinnie Barbarino,you've got Ellis Burman handling the makeup effects,and "Absolutely the most incredible ending of any motion picture" as a tagline.Couple all of that with delectable sneak-peak coverage in Famous Monsters way back when,and color me a kid who'd eat the green stuff on his dinner plate AND promise not to drill Aunt Eleanor in the floating ribs with a football as she walked up the hill carrying two armloads of brown bagged groceries just to see what promised to be a horror-shocker of epic proportions.Boy,I'm glad I ultimately never gave either of those in writing after finally seeing it.
Despite the fact that much of the civilized world despises the shit out of this movie,and having taken part in it probably delegated poor Fuest to Afternoon Special-Hell,directing tele-pictures for the remainder of his career,I can straight-facedly say that I do not hate it.Sure,it's a letdown when,by "most incredible ending" the film's producers simply meant "long",but it doesn't deserve Sea Monkey-letdown status,by any means.You know,you're six or seven years old reading your D.C. horror anthology comic books and you see the ad with the lure of adopting a little pink antennae-headed family of pals,and you get sent a packet of brine shrimp eggs.Unlike the "sea monkeys",which ate swirling,metallic kitchen drain-death,this film doesn't totally blow.Just mostly.

Mark Preston(The Shat-in-a-hat) demands a kosher ham-off with Corbis(Borgnine).
John Corbis(Ernest Borgnine) is a pot-bellied,gap-toothed satanic priest,at odds with the Preston family down through the ages for their betrayal and thievery of his unholy book o'signatures.You see,Corbis can capture people's immortal souls in this bulky,watermelon-shaped vessel with an ornate ram's head thrown on top for good measure,causing them to wander about in black hooded robes,eyeless pawns of evil,but without the book o'Hancocks,he's unable to deliver them down to the despicable duke of dirty-dealings himself.He captures the father of the family,then sends him back to them,demanding his stolen property and warning them of Corbis' pissoffedness, before the patriarch melts into a puddle of candlewaxy blech.Preston's son,Mark(William Shatner) is sent off to a dusty western movie backlot to confront the foul priest,armed with a gaudy crucifix pendant the size of a miniature horse,and a handgun.The two men square off in the desolate satanic church,but Preston's overdelivered Lord's Prayer is no match for the beerbellied parlour tricks of the Devil's disciple(and some cheap trick photography),who turns the crucifix into a relatively harmless constrictor,and introduces the man to his own eyeless mother,as one of the flock.Preston vainly flees,barrelling through robed retards like a Jewish Ken Foree on a Monroeville Mall shopping spree,cowboy hat in tow,but is eventually overtaken by Mephistopheles' moonies.

"Mistuh Kottuh!You ain' gon' belie' dis.Da othah Sweathogs stole mah eyes!"
Enter Mark's older brother,Tom(Tom Skerritt),who,along with his wife and Dr. Richards(Eddie Albert as a fucking psychic researcher,by God!!!),has been searching for his missing bro.After finding the church and jacking a nifty black robe,Tom slips in unnoticed among the foul flock to bear witness to the ceremony where Mark is transformed into an eyeless goon for the anti-good guys,and Corbis changes himself into,well,Corbis with a bit of latex,crepe wool,and some ram horns on top.The all-powerful priest finally discovers the intruder(you're probably more apt to have intruders when your following all wear bulky black robes),but Tom escapes.
Tom and Richards find the book Corbis has been looking for(just under the floorboards in the living room of the house Corbis had previously turned upside down,along with poor Woody "They had no eyesssss!" Chambliss,earlier in the picture...I would think if this book was so friggin' important to the Devil himself,his right hand man might have been,I dunno,a little more thorough in searching for it?),and while searching for the means to destroy Corbis in his empty church,they stumble upon the titular Devil's Rain soul-housing whatchamacallit,but leave the book unguarded,so that an eyeless sweathog(Travolta) can return it to Corbis.Just when it looks hopeless for the powers of righteous religious persecution in the name of Jesus Christ,eyeless Mark has a moment of humanity,and smashes the container.At this point,the roof of the church explodes,and a torrential rain covers all inside,causing everyone on the side of H-E-double hockey sticks to start melting.Thoroughly.About twenty drippy,gooey,bubbling minutes worth.Seriously,like,the edited television version inserted a commercial break somewhere in the middle of the melt,and after watching some anorexic coke whores walkin' cocky with Sassoon jeans on,you were back to Goat-nine's putrid,drippy,eye-hanging face melting into a puddle of tan liquid goo.But I digress.The church explodes,and Tom hugs his wife triumphantly afterwards,unaware that it's really Corbis in one of his tricky disguises,and his wife's soul is wailing away inside a new clear satanic watermelon.Duh duh DUH!The trick ending rears its ugly head once again.

Goat-nine sinisterly proclaims,"Apart from the Burman makeup effects herein,this movie is pretty baaaaaaaaaaad!"
...so yeah,there are enough quality cheese-factor elements in place here that might make for a marginally enjoyable experience for you,the cast honorably trudges through the candlewax,Shat and Borg,excellent as always,the effects are very good for the time period(the finale's eternal meltageddon included),and somewhere in here are a few creepy moments that keep the entire production from dipping(dripping?)into worthlessness.All-in-all,an average entry that should have earned a much,much higher Wopsploitation scale rating than it ended up scoring.I guess that'd be the letdown I was rambling about earlier.And,for the record,Aunt Eleanor,I apologize about your floating ribs,wherever you are.

A.....vessel....full of....souls,you say?


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"Witchcraft '70"(1970)d/Luigi Scattini

Just got through this seldom-seen "shockumentary" in two viewings(I fell asleep half way through the first time)after years of fruitless searching for a watchable copy.For the record,let me state that if true witchcraft was ANYTHING like what this film's makers captured on cameras back in 1970(and allegedly paid greenbacks for "secret 8 mm documentaries" from unknown individuals for),then the occult arts and black magic simply ain't much to write home to Aunt Beatrice about,period.

Newlyweds exclaim "King Diamond rules!" from Anton LaVey's Black Church.
The viewer is treated to 88 very tedious,tame minutes of occult practices in Bali,New Orleans,and California,among other places,all seen through the eyes of the mayor of squaresville.To validate their prudish outlook on the subject,they even interviewed a deaf-ish police officer with a speech impediment to emphasize the threat to society these cults pose.If witchcraft were to take hold of large numbers of the populace,he reasons,the world could arguably be gripped in a second medieval age,he lisps.And who would rule over these global covens,Officer Douchebag?Alice Cooper?

I really groove on Satan's cloven hooves,maaaan.
So what are the filmmakers committing to the big screen as a cautionary warning to parents of the world?Well,it seems the recurring themes in witchcraft back at the outset of the seventies were:
1)Nudity-You CANNOT show affection for the dark lord and master while your bell bottoms are still on.
2)Groovy dancing-Just like a Josie and the Pussycats musical segment,but with no troublesome clothes to get in the way.
3)Wine laced with L.S.D.-Nothing brings outta sight otherworldly demons to the party like mind-altering hallucinogens.
4)Guy in papier mache' goat mask-He only feels like a jackass until the naked,acid-soaked hippie chicks start grooving off of him.
5)Sexual freedom-Herein lies the true draw to the dark arts.You throw a pentagram necklace on,utter some mumbo jumbo,sip some chicken blood out of a metal chalice,you KNOW you're gonna get laid very shortly.
There you have it.Whether you're a Louisiana Voodoo Queen,or Anton LaVey,the devil is a means to get some righteous coital action.And if you're a parent of an impressionable teenaged hippie girl,monitor those acid rock concerts she's been seen grooving at,otherwise,she's gonna end up stoned and spreadeagle underneath some satanic cats somewhere in Death Valley.Those of us who don't touch up our drape haircuts with a belt sander knew all this beforehand,of course,but in brief intervals,this documentary could prove guilty amusement on a Wednesday night.

Wake up,warlock,you're supposed to be performing some spooky witchery!