Horrorfest 2012: The Last Exorcism

THE LAST EXORCISM is yet another in the "found footage" genre popularized by THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT. It's a horror mockumentary about an exorcist who has lost his faith and wants to take a film crew on his "last exorcism" to show just how fake everything really is.

Interestingly, this exorcist (Patrick Fabian) breaks the rules of horror movies by being Protestant instead of Catholic. He's a young family man who only kind of takes his own job as a reverend seriously and views the rural Louisiana family he's setting out to visit as the film begins as a bunch of superstitious hayseeds.

So, right away we have a couple interesting twists on old material. Putting the mockumentary style of the film aside for a moment, it's interesting to note that the skeptic in this film is also the core religious presence -- usually this genre sets up a struggle between a secular skeptic and a "wise" religious leader who knows the secrets of the spirit world. It's also interesting to note, again, that this is not an exorcist of the Catholic variety seen so often in films of this genre (whether portrayed accurately or not), but instead, the reverend of a mainstream mega-church, modern as can be, attacking the pulpit with the fire of a preacher and the savvy of a salesman.

Fabian is great in the lead, which helps with some of the creakier, less believable moments of the pseudo-documentary -- there are many chinks in the armor of "realism" where a quick viewer might think, "Wait -- if this is supposed to be a documentary, how did they...?" Ashley Bell is also great as the teenage victim of possession, believably vulnerable in her "normal" scenes and suitably creepy in her "possessed" scenes.

One of the most interesting things about this movie is that it keeps the viewer guessing for almost the entire running time as to whether or not this girl is really possessed. Since the exorcist main character doesn't even believe in his own trade, we're left wondering for much of the time whether or not this movie will end up proving the exorcist wrong or right. I don't want to give anything away, but I will say that I was pretty impressed with the movie up until the final minutes, when the story came to a solution that I felt was a little less interesting than some of the other solutions they entertained before making up their minds.

Still, THE LAST EXORCISM is better than it might sound on paper and is a little more than just a few previous classics stitched together. Not much, but a little.

Horrorfest 2012: Killer Klowns from Outer Space

KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE is a movie I remember seeing on video store shelves for years as a kid, but never got around to actually watching it until just now.

It's about what you'd expect -- a spoof of the paranoid sci-fi/horror flick in which invaders come from beyond the stars to capture/destroy humanity, and it's up to a group of kids to inform the authorities, who won't listen. Only this time, the alien invaders happen to look like circus clowns and have a spaceship that looks like a circus tent. The cocoons they trap their victims in look like cotton candy and their laser guns shoot popcorn. Am I forgetting anything? Oh yeah -- they also have balloon animal bloodhounds.

This movie works mostly because of the acting -- Grant Cramer stars as the lead teenager (or twenty-something? Hard to tell in these movies) and sets the tone with the right balance of "gee whiz" naivete and "aw shucks" incredulousness. He teams up with a local good-guy cop (John Allen Nelson) to rescue their mutual girlfriend (Suzanne Snyder) from the invading Klowns. John Vernon is on hand as a cranky cop who refuses to believe in the invasion, and Michael Siegel and Peter Licassi appear as a pair of horny brothers who hatch a scheme to drive an ice cream truck in an effort to get chicks. Whether or not they succeed I'll leave up to you to discover.

I think the star of this movie was meant to be the effects, and they did lead to a career for the team of writer/director/producer/everything else brothers, the Chiodos. There are a lot of inventive and effectively executed special effects scenes, but the Klowns themselves probably look better in stills than they do in motion.

To their credit, the Chiodo Brothers fully exploit their premise. They do not fall into the all-too-easy trap of coming up with a great premise and then failing to deliver. Instead, the milk the idea of killer clowns for all it is worth, checking off each clown cliche dutifully as they move along, from pies in the face all the way to clown cars. I guess that's the most important thing for a viewer of weird, low budget cult films -- you don't want to feel like you care more about the movie than the makers do. And it is clear the Chiodo Brothers put everything into KILLER KLOWNS.

Horrorfest 2012: Mad Monster Party?

Time for a bit of weirdness thanks the guys at Rankin/Bass with MAD MONSTER PARTY? You might recognize the names Rankin/Bass from the string of stop motion (and traditionally) animated holiday specials that are shown dutifully around Christmastime every year, like RUDOLPH THE RED-NOSED REINDEER and A YEAR WITHOUT A SANTA CLAUS.

I had never heard of MAD MONSTER PARTY? until just now, and I'm pleased to report that it is actually better than almost all of the more famous Christmas specials these guys put out. I've long decried the shittiness of these specials, each one more tacky and annoying than the last (with the possible exception of RUDOLPH), yet each one loved by those who haven't really watched them since they were 6.

Just what is it about these much-beloved specials that annoys me so much? I guess it's a combination of creepiness with crass commercialism. They each take a religious holiday and reduce it to the broadest, least emotionally meaningful stories possible. Meanwhile, the stop motion animation, while technically probably about as good as can be expected, given the circumstances, renders the supposedly cute subjects of these stories, like Santa Claus, creepy and weird thanks to their lack of timing and inherent jerkiness. You're left with nothing but unpleasantness, when you should be watching something nice.

This is just a long winded way of explaining why MAD MONSTER PARTY? works -- instead of working with cute subjects, Rankin/Bass is working with monsters, here. Instead of working with deeply meaningful faith-based holidays, this is the stuff of Halloween. Granted, some out there may take Halloween as a deeply meaningful faith-based holiday, but I've yet to meet them and if I ever do I'll assume they're full of shit.

So, ironically, MAD MONSTER PARTY? ends up being cute and charming, basically the opposite of every other Rankin/Bass production.

The story concerns Dr. Frankenstein (voiced by none other than Boris Karloff himself) discovering a potion that can destroy matter instantaneously, and holding a monster convention at his castle both to prevent this potion to his peers and to announce his retirement. The usual suspects show up for the convention, including Frankenstein's Monster, Dracula, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the Invisible Man, the Werewolf and others, and it isn't long before they're bickering about who gets to take over after Frankenstein retires.

One candidate to take over for Frankenstein is his buxom assistant, Francesca (Gale Garnett). But, not if the Monster's Mate (Phyllis Diller) can help it. Unbeknownst to them, Frankenstein plans to hand his legacy down to his nephew, a naive young pharmacist whose only monstrous quality is his allergies (Allen Swift).

Speaking of Allen Swift, he supplies most of the voices, here, and imbues Frankenstein's nephew with a nice Jimmy Stewart impression and Frankenstein's butler with the voice of Peter Lorre.

The movie starts out charmingly enough with lots of pun-based monster jokes penned by Mad magazine writer Harvey Kurtzman. However, the story often gets bogged down by uninspired song and dance numbers and runs about a half hour longer than it needs to.

Still, it's nice to know Rankin/Bass turned out something worth while inbetween bouts of making Santa Claus seems like a creepy dickhead.

Horrorfest 2012: Exit Humanity

Today we go back to zombies for EXIT HUMANITY, an ambitious but flawed recent Canadian indie flick about a zombie outbreak during Civil War times.

It's tough to judge a movie like this. On one hand, after one look, you know you're in for some amateurish filmmaking.  On the other, the filmmakers have such lofty goals and almost hit the mark so many times, you want to give them a pass. Is it good enough that a grain of salt puts it over the top? Or, is it "nice try, better luck next time."

The movie follows a Civil War vet (Mark Gibson) who has already lost his wife to the zombie plague and is now searching for his son. Along the way, he falls in with another survivor (Adam Seybold) who is searching for his sister (Jordan Hayes). She has been captured by an evil Confederate General (Bill Mosely) who is attempting to find a cure for the zombie outbreak with the help of an unethical surgeon (Stephen McHattie). Dee Wallace, of E.T. fame, is also on hand as a local recluse rumored to be a witch.

Although it has that "fake" look at times, much of the film looks very good. First time director John Geddes obviously has an eye for striking visuals. Still, it's hard to get over that undefinable "home video" look that comes with so many digitally shot indies these days. The makeup effects are great, and all of the acting is good, most especially Mark Gibson in the lead, who has some long stretches in the beginning of the film to carry single handedly.

About these long stretches -- maybe not the best way to start a movie. That's the main flaw here, beyond the look of the thing -- the pacing. This film is under 2 hours long and seems like it's 3. It gets tough to give a film a pass on good will alone when it feels this long and unwieldy.

There's also a somewhat clumsy framing device involving the main character's journal that is found some time after the events of the story. This journal provides the voice over narration (by Brian Cox!) that tells much of the story. Although it is often times quite well written, the ponderous, self-important voice over seems a little superfluous. I found myself wondering, during some of the slower passages, what the film would be like if it was just images. Would my mind be more engaged if I was putting things together myself, rather than listening to Brian Cox explain stuff to me? I wonder what the purpose of the narration was, at all. To remind us of that Ken Burns documentary, maybe?

So, anyway, ten million points for trying, but it was hard to keep my eyes open.

Horrorfest 2012: Vampire Circus

Today we leave the Blaxploitation genre but stick with the vampires for VAMPIRE CIRCUS. This is a  flick from England's Hammer studios, the horror masters second only to early Universal. Whenever you see the Hammer logo, you know you're in for a good time, and VAMPIRE CIRCUS does not disappoint.

Hell, the first ten minutes alone are worth the price of admission, as a sexy vampire (Domini Blythe) leads a little girl to her death at the hands of the local Count (Robert Tayman). How come Counts are always vampires? Or are vampires just always Counts?

Anyway, this is witnessed by a schoolmaster (Laurence Payne) who gets a mob together with the mayor (Thorley Walters) and attacks the Count's castle, burning it to the ground and murdering the Count, stake style. As the Count dies, he puts a curse on the village, claiming all of his murderers' children will die to bring him back from the dead. Again, this is within the first 10 minutes.

15 years later, the curse seems to have come true, as the town is crippled by a mysterious plague. There are roadblocks on the outskirts of town where armed men stand waiting to shoot anyone who dares to enter or leave.  This creates a very claustrophobic and intense atmosphere as a backdrop for the rest of the story, especially as a doctor (Richard Owens) makes a mad dash out of the town in hopes of finding a cure. His son and apprentice (John Moulder-Brown) first acts as a decoy to draw fire away from his father, and then stays behind to tend to the sick and dying.

This is when the circus shows up, mysteriously making it past the blockade, and distracting the town from its troubles. There's a gypsy woman (Adrienne Corri), a strongman (Dave Prowse, a.k.a. Darth Vader), a littler person (Skip Martin) a couple jungle cats and, of course, a monkey. There's also Emil (Anthony Corlan) who turns out to be the vampire Count's cousin, and, wouldn't you know it, turns out vampirism runs in the family.

The rest of the flick unfolds at a fairly breakneck pace as the circus of vampires kills off the town's children, and the townspeople try to figure out what's going on. The stakes rise as the schoolmaster's pretty, virginal daughter (Lynne Frederick) shows up at first as a love interest for the doctor's son, and later as prey for the vampires.

I guess if I had any complaints it would be that the editing is so frenetic and there are so many superfluous characters to keep track of that what amounts to a fairly simple story sometimes left me scratching my head, wondering what exactly was going on. Turns out, I was over thinking it -- nothing much was really going on, except rather stylish mayhem and carnage, thick with atmosphere, pretty girls and scenery chewing British thespians. The kind of stuff Hammer does best.

Horrorfest 2012: Scream Blacula Scream

Here's another Blaxploitation horror flick, this time SCREAM BLACULA SCREAM, sequel to BLACULA, a film I've never seen.

The formidable William Marshall stars as Blacula, a former African prince who was cursed with vampirism by Dracula himself. As this film begins, Blacula is resurrected by Willis (Richard Lawson, from yesterday's movie SUGAR HILL) the son of a recently deceased voodoo priestess. Willis wants control of his dead mother's cult, but since she didn't expressly name him as her successor, the cult decides it's time for a vote.  They'd rather have Willis' adopted sister Lisa (Pam Grier!) as their new leader.

This is where the Blacula resurrection comes in -- as far as I can tell, Willis intends to use Blacula to get his revenge on the cult or influence them in such a way that he'll eventually become leader.  Instead, Blacula instantly turns the tables on Willis, biting him and turning him into his vampire servant within seconds of being resurrected. It isn't long before Blacula realizes Willis' sister (still Pam Grier!) has awesome voodoo powers that might cure him of his curse, so he enlists her to help him. She readily falls under his spell since he's smoother than  Lando Calrissians.

This may all sound very exciting, but unfortunately the movie suffers from a languid pace. Despite Marshall's commanding performance as Blacula and the mere presence of Pam Grier in the film, it's hard to pay attention during some of the more boring stretches. I wish they had used Pam Grier more effectively -- as it stands, she doesn't really come into her own until the last few minutes of the movie.

There are some memorable moments, though. Some of them involve Willis' disappointments with his new lot in life (or death). First, he's pissed that he can't see himself in the mirror anymore, now that he's a vampire. How is a brother supposed to make sure he looks good before he goes out? Then, his life style is further cramped when his nagging girlfriend from life joins him in undeath and just keeps on nagging. Poor Willis.

The most memorable moment of all, though, comes when Marshall one-ups Sidney Poitier by screaming "Call me Blacula!"

Horrorfest 2012: Sugar Hill

It’s that time of the year again – Horrorfest! For the last three years now I’ve watched 31 horror films in 31 days and written about all of them in honor of Halloween. The first year was kind of made up as I went along, including flicks I’d already seen before but felt like watching again. The last two years I tried to go out of my way to watch films I had never seen before, or had only seen part of, working off of “best of” lists. The problem with that is, eventually you’ve seen everything on most “best of” lists.

So, this year, I’ve decided to watch the highest rated films available through the Netflix watch instantly service. This limits the possibilities a little bit because, of course, Netflix has a limited catalog. Also, it isn’t really a “best of” in the traditional sense, since this is based on audience ratings. Still, I was able to come up with the top 31 highest rated Netflix watch instantly films that I haven’t seen yet, and that’s what I’ll be watching this month.

We’re starting with SUGAR HILL, a mixture of Blaxploitation and horror from American International pictures. I don’t think I’ve done any Blaxploitation in previous Horrorfests, so I was excited to see this picture.

It starts familiarly enough, with a bizarre voodoo ritual, a common opening for voodoo/zombie films of this sort. But, the film comes quickly with the surprises as the opening credits are set to a funky song called “Supernatural Voodoo Woman” and the voodoo ritual is revealed to be a stage show at a Haitian-themed night club.

We’re quickly introduced to the owner of the night club, Langston (Larry Don Johnson) who is dating the titular heroine (or anti-heroine as the case may be) Sugar Hill (Marki Bey). Sugar Hill ditched her nice-guy cop boyfriend (the awesomely afro’d Richard Lawson) for the somewhat sleazy and pimpy Langston, who is refusing to sell his night club to an evil white crime lord (American International mainstay Robert Quarry). Langston is repaid for his refusal when the white crime lord sends a group of thugs led by the even more pimp-esque Fabulous (Charles Robinson) to kill him.

Distraught with her lover’s death, Sugar Hill springs into action with a revenge plot. This is where the horror elements come into the story – instead of settling for the usual Pam Grier method (guns), Sugar Hill approaches the local voodoo priestess (Zara Cully) who raises an army of undead ex-slave zombies, led by the equally undead Baron Samedi (Don Pedro Colley, possibly the most pimp of all).

What follows is a series of gruesome murders in which the zombie army follows Sugar Hill’s orders to destroy her enemies while Sugar Hill reads out their death sentences and watches with grim satisfaction, working through the gang of thugs and up to their boss.

SUGAR HILL starts off as a promising unique take on 3 dramas – it makes zombies, revenge and Blaxploitation seem new simply by combining them. Unfortunately, it is repetitively paced and after the premise is set up there is little to keep the viewer interested other than gore and the magnetic central presence of Marki Bey as Sugar Hill. I wish she had more to do – as it stands, she mostly looks on in satisfaction as zombies carry out her will, which gets old after a while.