Horrorfest 2025: First Man into Space

First Man into Space
Written by Wyott Ordung, John Croydon and Charles F. Vetter
Directed by Robert Day
Starring Marshall Thompson, Marla Landi, Bill Edwards and Robert Ayres
USA, 1959

This clumsily titled slice of sci-fi horror follows the misadventures of an astronaut who returns from space as a monster on a killing spree. Only his square-jawed military brother can hunt him down and stop him.

My little synopsis above is more tongue in cheek than this movie is, by a lot. The unique thing about this paranoid 50s thriller is how deadly serious it is. All the space stuff up front seems plausible, and the solution in the end manages to be bother science-based, while also involving an emotional sacrifice and some character growth. You could accuse this short flick of being a little dry and a little slow, but you can’t accuse it of not being the real thing.

Horrorfest 2025: The Front Room

The Front Room
Written and directed by Max and Sam Eggers
Based on the short story by Susan Hill
Starring Brandy, Andrew Burnap, Neal Huff and Kathryn Hunter
USA, 2024

Brandy returns to horror in THE FRONT ROOM, a tale of an interracial couple who find themselves taking care of the husband’s ailing stepmother, who turns out to be a racist. And also might be a witch or something. Who knows? This movie doesn’t. Neither do I.

The trailers sold this thing as a GET OUT-like examination of how racism manifests itself in society, both as a festering wound in the past and a legacy to live with. The movie itself touches on the racism a little bit but it's more concerned with how annoying it is to have to take care of an old person.

To be fair: there are more than enough obvious moments in this movie to show that the elderly stepmother is, indeed, deliberately fucking with Brandy’s character, who is a new mother who recently quit her academic job because they were treating her like shit. The stepmother (Kathryn Hunter) is clearly manipulative and abusive. But, this stuff is complicated by money. She offers the couple all her inheritance. Having been absued by herself in the past, her stepson (Neal Huff) wants nothing to do with her and refuses. It’s Brandy who argues they should take her in, cuz they need money.

So, turns out, they should not have taken her in.

While it is undeniably true that it is very hard work, both physically and emotionally, to take care of people, especially loved ones, and especially people who are difficult on a good day, it is also difficult to sympathize with Brandy and the things she ends up doing when some other solution could have easily been reached. If it’s supposed to be about a descent into madness on Brandy’s part, it didn’t go far enough. But, I don’t think it’s really supposed to be about that. So instead it went too far, I guess.

Still, I’d be remiss if I did not mention Kathryn Hunter is amazing in this flick and deserves all the awards she will never get for it.

Horrorfest 2025: The Woman in the Yard

The Woman in the Yard
Written by Sam Stefanak
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra
Starring Danielle Deadwyler, Okwui Okpokwasili, Peyton Jackson and Russell Hornsby
USA, 2025

A depressed widow and mother of two, still recovering from the car accident that took her husband’s life, wakes up one morning to find a mysterious shrouded woman sitting in the yard of her isolated farmhouse, refusing to leave.

Sounds like one of those creepily simple premises you can get lots of mileage out of, right? Like, it would be weird, right, if someone was in your yard and wouldn’t leave? Even if they weren’t supernatural or anything like that.

Unfortunately this movie never delivers and is mostly just boring and needlessly confusing. It is one of the many recent horror movies that has seized on the trend of kind of trying to walk the line between “nothing happening” and “being scary,” inspired by indie flicks that get a lot out of tone, atmosphere and character development.

I’m not saying movies have to be all sunshine and lollipops, but if ever there was a relentlessly depressing movie, it’s this one, as the lead character is so realistically depressed that she is emotionally and physically abusive to her own children. So, she’s hard to root for, even if you know these people exist and deserve empathy. In real life, I gotta convince myself. At the movies, it’s the movie’s job to convince me. This movie doesn’t.

 

Horrorfest 2025: Wishmaster

Wishmaster
Written by Peter Atkins
Directed by Robert Kurtzman
Starring Tammy Lauren, Andrew Divoff, Kane Hodder, Tony Todd and Robert Englund
USA, 1997

Since I came of age in the 90s, 90s flicks rarely look dated to me. WISHMASTER is a huge exception. Every frame of this thing looks old.

Part of this is because WISHMASTER came along in 1997, a time when CGI was ubiquitous enough to be in lower budget movies but not good enough to look good in low budget movies. 

Add to this the fact that they use CGI effects right up next to pretty great practical effects, and the CGI stands out as glaringly bad. There’s one scene early on in which a skeleton emerges from a man and gets up and walks around. As it’s emerging from a man, it’s a real practical effect and looks awesome. As it stands up and walks around, it’s shitty CGI, and looks stupid.

Anyway, WISHMASTER tells the tale of a djinn (genie) who is awakened in the 90s and wants to take over the world. If he can get someone to make three wishes, he can break down the walls between worlds and all his djinn buddies can come in. I think. It’s something like that. I don’t totally get the rules here cuz for part of the thing is that djinns are all powerful, but can only use their magic to grant a wish. So, the djinn spends a lot of screen time trying to manipulate people into making wishes. But then, other times, he just uses magic, anyway. So, not sure what’s going on there, or why he doesn’t just get the first person he meets to make three wishes, instead of specifically targeting the person who rubbed his… stone.

Add to this the fact that the djinn, like genies in many stories, has a ton of flexibility when it comes to how he interprets these wishes. Sometimes it’s so broad he might as well not be granting a wish at all. So why this charade? Also, who cares?

The good stuff here comes in the form of Andrew Divoff and his performance as the Djinn. He gives off a perfect weird, creepy vibe and is not afraid to help himself to the scenery. Also, the PRACTICAL effects and makeup are great. As long as the shoddy CGI isn’t on screen, this works as a fun showcase for some crazy effects. Genre fans will enjoy supporting roles and cameos of horror icons, including Robert Englund, Tony Todd and a whole lot more.

Horrorfest 2025: Phenomena

Phenomena
Written by Dario Argento and Franco Ferrini
Directed by Dario Argento
Starring Jennifer Connelly, Daria Nicolodi, Dalila Di Lazzaro, Patrick Bauchau and Donald Pleasence
Italy, 1985

I’ve bagged on Italian horror here before and I guess that’s mainly because of Lucio Fulci, though they’re all offenders in their own way. Even though I feel like I’ve exhausted Dario Argento’s filmography, this 1985 flick popped up on my radar and it has two recognizable stars in Jennifer Connelly and Donal Pleasence, so I figured I’d give it a go.

PHENOMENA does suffer from some of the excesses of Italian horror, relying a little too much on long, drawn-out dream sequences and shocking moments of gore. They usually sacrifice any semblance of logic at the altar of just being crazy, and this one kinda does that, though it’s mostly the premise’s fault – get this. A teen girl, sent to a boarding school in the Swiss Alps, can telepathically communicate with bugs. An entymologist teams up with her to try to solve a string of serial murders going down in the area. His reasoning? Since bugs are involved in decomposition, they might lead her to the bodies.

There’s more to it than that, but them’s the basics. As usual, no matter how bored I got I still could not guess who the killer was or why they were killing, and as lame as some of the middle passages of this film are, the climax does have to be seen to be believed. I don’t want to give too much away, but I will say it does not violate the Chekhov’s monkey rule like RETURN OF DR. X did, much to my delight.

Also of note is the dope ass soundtrack this thing has going featuring the likes of Iron Maiden and Motörhead. I’d say Goblin’s on hand to contribute, too, except with Argento, that’s basically a given.

Horrorfest 2025: Student Bodies

Student Bodies
Written and directed by Mickey Rose
Starring Kristen Riter, Matt Goldsby and Cullen Chambers
USA, 1981

STUDENT BODIES is one of those flicks with VHS box art so good you probably sorta remember it even though the movie itself has sort of faded out of the public consciousness. I always figured it was one of those slasher first, comedy second flicks like SLEEPAWAY CAMP, but it turns out this is basically an AIRPLANE! or NAKED GUN-level send up of slashers. No holds are barred when it comes to the jokes and taste need not apply.

As the movie started, it was almost too much for me. Even though I compared it to a couple Zucker classics above, that’s more in style and tone, not necessarily in quality or execution. STUDENT BODIES wishes it was those movies. Every now and then it gets there, but a lot of the jokes are too corny even for me. Still, I have to admit, I laughed a few times in spite of myself, and a lot of that is because the sense of humor is just so weird and particular that I kinda had to.

STUDENT BODIES borrows its plot from slashers like HALLOWEEN, and has the “good girl” desperately trying to figure out who the heavy-breathing, first-person killer is before the next teen couple who sneaks off to hook up at an inopportune time gets offed. There are a lot of suspects and, I have to admit, I did not guess the ending. In some ways the movie is ahead of its time, presaging SCREAM a little bit. I assume Kevin Williamson MUST have rented this as teenager.

Interestingly, the stars of this indie product (which was picked up and released by Paramount), never really went on to do anything else. I say that’s interesting because they’re all pretty good for being Texas locals who never set foot in Hollywood. The movie’s worth watching just to see all the get-up-and-go on display, here.

But, it can be a tough watch. There are pacing issues, the jokes are all over the place, and it’s repetitive, by design. Still, I’ve seen dumber slashers and sadder comedies, for sure. 

 

Horrorfest 2025: Blood for Dracula

Blood for Dracula
Written and directed by Paul Morrissey
Based on the novel by Bram Stoker
Starring Joe Dallesandro, Udo Kier, Maxime McKendry and Vittorio de Sica
Italy/France, 1975

In the 70s, filmmaker and Andy Warhol bro Paul Morrissey made a duo of monster movies featuring amped up sex, violence and nudity, FLESH FOR FRANKENSTEIN (featured in a previous Horrorfest) and BLOOD FOR DRACULA, both starring Udo Kier and Joe Dallesandro. Now that I’ve seen both I can say I prefer FRANKENSTEIN, but they might make a nice double feature.

This liberal adaptation of Dracula has an aging Count (Kier) traveling to Italy at the suggestion of his servant (Arno Jürging). He needs the blood of virgins to regain his vitality, and his servant incorrectly reasons Italy will be lousy with them because they’re all Catholic. The Count reluctantly sets out on this journey and ends up at the broken-down estate of an Italian landowner who has four daughters. That’s four potential virgins! But this is a dark comedy and the joke’s on Dracula as 50% of them are all sexed up by the live-in handyman (Joe Dallesandro) who is also a misogynist Marxist.

The strongest element of this movie is the dark humor, mostly manifesting itself in Kier’s performance as a Dracula who is just so over it. He’s sick of being a vampire. His servant seems more into Dracula being a vampire than Dracula does. Just put him out of his misery, already. He’s great in the role and it’s a shame the rest of the movie doesn’t live up to him.

Warhol superstar Dallesandro, on the other hand, may be a hunk, I guess, but he’s not much of an actor, as far as I can tell.

As far as bringing anything new to the table in the world of Dracula, the movie clearly wants to hint at social importance by getting into the Marx stuff, but its real contributions to vamp lore are in the scenes that treat Dracula as no more than a junkie fiending for his fix. The film spends a lot of time dwelling on Dracula’s sickness and discomfort when he can’t get his blood, or, more graphically, when he gets the wrong kind (non virgin).

While the movie’s mostly boring, the climax is insane, so you can fast forward to that after you get enough of Kier’s fabulously bored and fed-up performance.