slasher – Page 4 – Horror Ghouls

My Bloody Valentine (2009)

Posted on August 16, 2019February 28, 2022 by HorrorGhouls

In the small mine town community of Harmony, a young coal miner named Tom (Jensen Ackles) causes an accident that kills five men and puts another, Harry Warden, in a coma. A year later, Harry wakes up and causes a massacre at the hospital, and in the meantime a group of teens are having a party at mine tunnel 5, one of them being Tom. Harry shows up and causing further bloodshed, but the police does not succeed in catching the killer…

Ten years later, the mining town has gotten the unfortunate title “The Murder Capital of America” by the media, while they are still trying to move on from the past. Tom, who is pretty much not welcomed by most of the townspeople, happens to stop by to sign some papers to sell the mining tunnel where the killings took place. Bad news is that the signing has been postponed to Monday, so Tom has some time to kill (pun intended) before he leaves the town for good. After Tom checks into a motel, the killings start to happen again by a certain familiar figure wearing a gas mask.

“My Bloody Valentine” is the remake of the 1981 version, here with Jensen Ackles (or just Dean Winchester, if you will) in the main role. And it’s pretty much like watching Ackles just playing Dean having a really bad weekend with a reduced energy level. The Kiefer Sutherland effect, as I like to call it.

I don’t know if this is the same version that got screened in theaters back in 2009, but if so, the “Friday The 13th” remake which came same year looks like a kiddies movie made for Disney in comparison. A funny coincidence is that Jared Padalecki, known as Dean’s brother in “Supernatural”, also had a role in the Friday remake. As if they made a bet on which movie that would turn out to be the goriest. Well, Sammy, I guess you owe Dean a drink.

This was also the first 3D film with an R-rating, and it clearly shows. Heads are being chopped off, torsos cut in half, hearts ripped out, and whatnot. There’s also a scene where a midget lady gets impaled by a picksaw. No mercy given. And of course, there’s no slasher without a hot chick being chased while she’s stark naked. Some of the 3D effects looks pretty silly without the glasses, though, but it’s still a an entertaining slasher with some great death scenes.

Director: Patrick Lussier
Country & year: USA, 2009
Actors: Jensen Ackles, Jaime King, Kerr Smith, Betsy Rue, Edi Gathegi, Tom Atkins, Kevin Tighe, Megan Boone, Karen Baum, Joy de la Paz, Marc Macaulay, Todd Farmer, Jeff Hochendoner, Bingo O’Malley, Liam Rhodes
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1179891/

Terrifier (2016)

Posted on August 3, 2019November 8, 2024 by HorrorGhouls

The two girlfriends Tara and Dawn are leaving a Halloween party late at night, and stops by a pizza restaurant. After Dawn has taken her “longest piss ever”, a tall and skinny person dressed as a clown-like weirdo comes in with a trash-bag over his shoulders. He sits down by the table across them and gives them an intimidating stare, not uttering a single word. He starts to make faces and evil grins, which is creeping out Tara since she’s the one he’s showing most of his attention to. Dawn, who is slightly drunk and in a funny-mood, tries to laugh it off and plays along by taking a selfie with him. After all, it’s Halloween, so he must be a harmless weirdo who’s just trolling them (or in this case clowning them), right? Oh, well…

After Tara and Dawn have left, Art the Clown (which is the creepy clown’s name) returns to the restaurant to do some unfinished business in a pretty graphic killing scene, which gives us a foretaste of what to come. He chops a guy’s head off to make a Jack-O-Lantern of it, and another guy gets his fingers chopped off before he stabs both of his eyes out. Then Art is going after the two girls to get his brunette (Tara). And anyone that gets in his way gets killed, or executed, to put it more correctly.

“Terrifier” is written and directed by Damien Leone, and based on his short film with the same title from 2011. It is also a spinoff of his previous film “All Hallows Eve” (which I’ve not seen yet). His CV is mainly listing him as a special effects and make up artist, and “Terrifier” shows that he has a good eye and steady hand as a director as well. The film is a love-letter to the 80’s slasher films, with only practical and old school effects. And they are awesome. The death scenes are creative, juicy and gruesome, and even though there’s not much characters here, the actors are doing a good job. “Terrifier” is more a cat-and-mouse game filled with tension from start to finish.

But the man of the hour here is undoubtedly Art the Killer Clown.

In Ed Gein-style we get a scene where Art mutilates a girl while she’s hanging upside-down by her legs, and uses her upper torso as an outfit while he dances around like a drunk schizophrenic lunatic. David Howard Thornton is the actor behind Art the Clown, and he’s clearly having the time of his life playing this character with a high level of energy and enthusiasm. Art is also mute and plays only on facial expressions and body language, and David makes the character creepy and believable, and just a joy to watch. And in this never ending era of remakes and reboots it is a breath of fresh air to see a new slasher villain.

And some great news that broke recently: Terrifier 2, which will also be directed by Damien Leone and starring David as Art The Clown once more, is in pre-production and set to be released in 2020.

Director: Damien Leone
Country & year: USA, 2016
Actors: Jenna Kanell, Samantha Scaffidi, David Howard Thornton, Catherine Corcoran, Pooya Mohseni, Matt McAllister
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt4281724/

Sequels:
– Terrifier 2 (2022)
– Terrifier 3 (2024)

Child’s Play (2019)

Posted on July 20, 2019June 26, 2024 by HorrorGhouls

Kaslan Products have invented a brand new toy: Buddi, the interactive doll that is the most high-tech product available that can also connect to all other Kaslan products and smart home devices. These dolls are produced at a factory in Vietnam, under terrible working conditions. The movie starts off showing us one of the depressed workers getting harassed and fired, and before finishing his final Buddi doll, he removes all safety precautions before he commits suicide by throwing himself off the roof of the factory. Of course, no one knows that the latest doll he worked on was been tempered with, and it is shipped off together with all the others…

Soon afterwards, we meet Andy and his mother, Karen, who have just moved to a new place and is trying to settle in. Karen is working at the local hypermarket, that is also selling Buddi dolls on a regular basis. When one of the customers returns a Buddi doll due to it being defected, she decides to bring this doll back home to give it to her son. Despite not working the way it’s supposed to, both Andy and Karen believes it’s just a harmless defect. When Andy can make it swear and do funny things that would not be possible with any of the “normal” Buddi dolls, he’s also able to befriend some of the neighboring kids. All seem fine to Andy for a while…but with this doll having all safety protocols disabled, it’s soon showing signs of a behavior that can turn out to be quite dangerous.

“Child’s Play” is a remake of the 1988 classic by the same name, and is directed by Lars Klevberg. This movie is quite different from the original story, however. In the original film, the soul of a serial killer (Charles Lee “Chucky” Ray) entered one of the dolls after being chased and killed inside a toy shop. In this remake, we get a modernized version where Chucky is simply an AI doll that’s been tampered with, and developing a behavior that is not really his fault. In many ways, you can even sympathize a bit with Chucky in certain scenes, like when Andy and his friends are watching a horror movie (“Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2”, which was in fact totally banned here in Norway back in the day…something I suppose director Lars Klevberg knew since he’s Norwegian as well). When the kids start laughing and enjoying themselves, Chucky believes that the killings are “fun”, and he goes to the kitchen and brings back a knife as he believes it will make them laugh. And the doll shows signs of distress and confusion when it realizes that this did not make Andy and his friends happy at all. Thus, Chucky is a completely different “villain” than in the original…and while the original is a horror classic from the 80’s, it’s refreshing to see a remake that does something completely different. When Chucky goes crazy and starts killing, it’s all based on a wish to keep Andy safe and happy. And to be his “best buddy”…

The doll is voiced by Mark Hamill, in which we get a little “Star Wars” reference when Andy tries to make the doll name itself “Han Solo”, but due to the defect it thinks he said “Chucky” (which, of course, references the original “Child’s Play”). The movie also brings us some pretty neat killing scenes, and a fair amount of blood and gore. It’s entertaining and fresh, just don’t expect the same story as the one from 1988 as this is a totally reimagined version.

Director: Lars Klevberg
Country & year: USA, 2019
Actors: Aubrey Plaza, Mark Hamill, Brian Tyree Henry, Tim Matheson, Gabriel Bateman, David Lewis, Trent Redekop, Beatrice Kitsos, Ty Consiglio, Carlease Burke, Hannah Drew, Kristin York, Zahra Anderson, Marlon Kazadi, Nicole Anthony
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt8663516/

The Burning (1981)

Posted on June 5, 2019February 28, 2022 by HorrorGhouls

It’s a hot summer night in Camp Blackfoot, where a group of teenagers are preparing to pull the prank of the year on the camp’s caretaker, Cropsy. We learn that he’s obviously a bully who deserves a lesson, and the kids also learn in the hard way that a prank with matches and fire isn’t the best combination. They sneak into his cabin, planning to scare him with a rotten skull full of maggots and candles in its eye sockets. It gets from bad to worse when the fire gets to Cropsy himself, and he runs out in full flame, with the kids being helpless witnesses as he stumbles down to the lake. Five years later, he is released from the hospital, completely deformed and disfigured by the burning, and of course, hungry for revenge.

So this is the premise of “The Burning”, the film which is best known for kick-starting the movie career for the Weinstein brothers, Harvey and Bob. Having founded the company Miramax Films in 1979, with only two obscure films in its catalog, the young brothers were desperate for a hit. And having realized that making a slasher is quick and cheap and could be big business like both “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” and John Carpenter’s “Halloween”, and other slashers who came and went. So, why not. Harvey Weinstein was inspired by Cropsey, a boogeyman-urban legend from New York that was a popular campfire story, but ended up using only the name for the movie’s killer. And yeah, we all know at this point who turned out to be the real boogeyman here, but that’s a whole different story. Brother Bob was involved in writing the script and their mommy Mira worked as a consultant. So this was more or less a family project. The Brit Tony Maylan, who previously made documentaries, was set to direct while Jack Sholder worked as the editor, who later made “Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge”. Yes-keyboardist Rick Wakeman gives a great soundtrack, and Tom Savini stands for the effects. But the big star here is probably a young Jason “George Costanza” Alexander in one of the roles. Here he is 22, slim and has hair. Would you imagine. This was also his debut role. And no, we don’t get a twist where Cropsy is actually Cosmo Kramer, even though it’s a hilarious thought. And enough Seinfeld references for today.

With some great talents in place with lots of potential, it’s too bad that the film itself is nothing much. After the opening sequence and a quick, gritty scene where Cropsy, dressed as a giallo killer, visits a brothel and find his weapon of choice with which he kills one of the whores before he heads to the camp, the film is pretty dull and boring. There’s too far between the interesting moments, and most of the second act is just lots of filler scenes where the kids bathe, smoke, and mostly do nothing to keep the interest up. No build up, no tension, just a bunch of random scenes that goes nowhere. And visually this looks more like a cheap teen comedy, where atmosphere is nowhere to be found. And the night scenes in the woods that were shot day-for-night…why even bother? This is just lazy and uninspiring. Yawn. Where did the budget go? Who knows. So, where’s all the killing scenes? In the last twenty minutes, if you’re patient. And some of them are brutal and juicy, at least.

And if you want to know more about the original “Cropsey”, watch the documentary “Cropsey” from 2009.

Director: Tony Maylam
Country & year: USA, 1981
Actors: Brian Matthews, Leah Ayres, Brian Backer, Larry Joshua, Jason Alexander, Ned Eisenberg, Carrick Glenn, Carolyn Houlihan, Fisher Stevens, Lou David
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0082118/

Violent Shit (1989)

Posted on April 18, 2019September 18, 2024 by HorrorGhouls

Somewhere in Germany we see a random boy who’s playing with a ball, and gets spanked by his mom for coming home late. The boy then kills her with a meat cleaver, and our new terrifying slasher villain “Karl the Butcher” (or simply “The Butcher”) is born. Then we skip twenty years later where The Butcher is being transported by the polizei from-or-to God knows. Then one of the transporters have to take a piss, and The Butcher manages to escape as soon they stop the car, and kills them all in the worst low budget-way which is pretty indescribable. And we’re only seven minutes in, so take this as a foretaste to what the rest of the movie will be.

Then we’re being introduced to a nameless blonde chick who drives to a gas station, parks the car and switches to an other car to continue driving. When she arrives at the countryside and into the woods, the car dies and she yells “scheisse”, which describes this movie pretty well so far. And now that it’s gotten dark and her being all alone, what could happen? We see The Butcher from pov-view while he halts and grunts like a pig, then attacks her, and cuts one of her titties off. Make me wonder if Lars Von Trier has seen this. However, he then butches her to pieces (off camera) and eats some of her entrails. Yummy, good night.

Next day, The Butcher hunts for more victims in the countryside when something unexpected happens: he suddenly collapses. Maybe food poisoning from the woman’s guts he ate last night? Or maybe the actor is simply tired of this (violent) shit and realized that his performance never would lead to any Oscar Nominations, and would rather go home and play Nintendo? Who knows. Movie over? No way! We haven’t even gotten halfway through its running time. Then we meet our next victim who by a coincidence spots The Butcher laying by the road. And, like nice and empathic people do, he checks if he needs help, which of course turns to be quite opposite when The Butcher grabs his meat cleaver and cuts his hand off. And his dick, which he don’t eat. Thank God. And in order to not waste any precious time, we’re jumping straight over to the next victim, an aggravated redneck, played by the director Andreas Schnaas himself, who yells (in German) “fucking shit”. At least, the movie seems to have a sense of self-awareness.

And at this point I think you know the drill: every new character who gets on camera is just set up to be the next victim and killed off as quickly as they came, like a fart in the wind. So yeah, Violent Shit couldn’t be a more blunt and fitting title: It’s Violent Shit and that’s exactly what you get. A bunch of death scenes filmed over four weeks, “directed” (to use that word loosely) by Andreas Schnaas, who is a part of the trinity of the underground horror scene from Germany, along with Olaf Ittenbach and Jörg Buttgereit. Shot with his friends and with a budget that was enough to buy some gallons of cranberry juice as fake blood, rent a low-fi Video-8 format-camera and buy a lot of Heineken. The result is something you would expect to see from some kids in their early teens made for shits and giggles in their back yard on a weekend without any goal, purpose, ambition or a script.

One thing’s for sure: if you’re a fan of non-budget-amateurish-splatter horror, Violent Shit won’t fail to entertain you. The witty German dialogue, which apparently are just improvised and dubbed in post-production, makes it even more funny. Also worth mentioning that Andreas Shnaaas did the impressive thing of actually managing to drag his Violent Shit to the movie theaters in Germany, but it was pulled shortly after when it got under the censor board’s radar. It eventually found its way over to the USA where it became an underground cult classic on VHS.

A “Five Films Collector’s Shitition” with all of the four Violent Shit-films and the zombie flick “Zombie ’90: Extreme Pestilence” is available from Synapse Films. Knock yourself out. I couldn’t find any trailer, but down below you can see a clip with Karl The Butcher in action showing no mercy.

Director: Andreas Schnaas
Country & year: Germany, 1989
Actors: Andreas Schnaas, Gabi Bäzner, Wolfgang Hinz, Volker Mechter, Christian Biallas, Uwe Boldt
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0094271/

Sequels:
– Violent Shit II (1992)
– Violent Shit III: Infantry of Doom (1999)
– Violent Shit 4: Karl the Butcher vs Axe (2010)

Hell Fest (2018)

Posted on March 28, 2019February 28, 2022 by HorrorGhouls

A masked serial killer turns a horror-themed amusement park into his own personal playground, terrorizing a group of friends while the rest of the patrons believe that it is all part of the show.

“Hell Fest” is a slasher movie with a rather interesting concept: a masked killer masquerading as one of the crew in a Halloween amusement park, killing people while confused bystanders thinks it’s part of the show. In one regard, “Hell Fest” delivers pretty well when it comes to the setting: the amusement park looks totally awesome, and while we were both watching it we agreed that the most exciting thing in the whole movie was to see new parts of the park. Unfortunately, that also tells wonders about what this movie lacks: real suspense and a mystery surrounding the killer, both of which are, unfortunately, non-existent. We find out early in the movie that the killer is a stranger (no mystery about who he is), and while the first murder is pleasantly vicious, the next killings are quite uninspired and lacking in gruesomeness.

Now, slasher movies rarely brings anything new to the horror genre. A group of people gets stalked and murdered, one by one, by a mysterious killer. You’ve seen it before, and you’re going to see it again if you ever keep watching slasher movies. However, what a lot of them at least manages to keep going for them, is an actual mystery surrounding the killer (makes you wonder who it is, and often comes as a surprise/twist), or gory/gruesome murder scenes. “Hell Fest” has neither, but a totally awesome amusement park at least…

All that being said: it’s not a bad movie, and should easily be able to entertain you if you take it for an easy-going popcorn movie. But with such an awesome setting, it just could have been so much more.

Director: Gregory Plotkin
Country & year: USA, 2018
Actors: Cynthea Mercado, Stephen Conroy, Amy Forsyth, Bex Taylor-Klaus, Reign Edwards, Christian James, Matt Mercurio, Roby Attal
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt1999890/

Hell’s Ground (2007)

Posted on February 15, 2019February 28, 2022 by HorrorGhouls

The movie opens with a guy who crashes his car in the woods and then gets beat to death with a shovel. Then we get to another location where a creepy, disturbed old dude in a bloody shirt looks straight into the camera and says “you’re on the road to hell, my children” (in urdu) and ends it with an evil laugh. Yikes..

Then we get introduced to some teenagers who prepare for a road trip out in the countryside of Pakistan, something their parents are not so happy with. At the same time, the government puts out a warning regarding the water, as it could be infected with some virus that turns people into zombies. After a while on the road, and smoking dope, the kids stop at Deewanas Tea Shop, a real stinky shithole of a place, run by the creepy old dude we saw in the beginning. He drools while mumbling about a place called Hells Ground, while the kids buy some potatoes and moves on. Then the phone signal disappears and the van that had a full tank is suddenly empty, and after getting lost in the woods, they find themselves surrounded by a horde of zombies. If all this was not bad enough, a serial killer wearing a burqa and a big spiked ball is on the loose. Welcome to Hell’s Ground..

Hells Ground (aka Zibahkhana) is known as Pakistan’s first slasher-flick. The film is as much a Texas Chainsaw Massacre-worship as it is a tribute to 70’s horror. The film also works as a kind of a big rebellious middle-finger to Pakistan’s strict authority and religion, so yeah, the film has some huge balls, as huge as the film’s slasher villain uses as the murder weapon.

Otherwise, there’s not much new under the sun here. It’s a straight-forward slasher-flick mixed with some zombies and the same old character tropes we have seen a thousand times. Visually, the film looks great, it’s well directed and has that raw, unpolished 70s-look. The use of dirty, disgusting locations and intense colorful lighting with the environment of Pakistan’s countryside, gives it an eerie and unique atmosphere.

And the scenes with Burqaface alone makes the movie worth a watch.

Director: Omar Kahn
Country & year: Pakistan / UK, 2007
Actors: Kunwar Ali Roshan, Rooshanie Ejaz, Rubya Chaudhry Haider Raza, Osman Khalid Butt, Rehan, Najma Malik
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0887973/

Happy Death Day (2017)

Posted on February 15, 2019November 7, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Tree Gelbman, a young college student, wakes up in a guy’s room, hungover as hell and barely no memory from last night. On top of it all, it’s her birthday today, a day she is not too fond of for reasons later revealed in the movie. She leaves the guy’s room with a pissy attitude, and we see pretty quickly that this is a girl that tends to make bad choices in her life, and treat people around her like crap. At the end of the day, she gets chased by someone wearing a mask, and ends up being killed. And then she wakes up in the guy’s room again, repeating the day all over again. In a desperate fight to reveal the identity of the killer, and try to figure out how to avoid being killed by him/her, she relives the day of her birthday and murder over and over…

«Happy Death Day» goes into a concept that has been touched multiple times over in other movies and tv-series: that of reliving a specific day over and over (Groundhog Day, Triangle and Timecrimes, just to mention some). So in that regard, this movie brings nothing new or groundbreaking to the horror genre. It’s a simple yet entertaining horror comedy that is best served without any expectations in mind.

Director: Christopher Landon
Country & year: USA, 2017
Actors: Jessica Rothe, Israel Broussard, Ruby Modine, Charles Aitken, Laura Clifton, Jason Bayle, Rob Mello, Rachel Matthews
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt5308322/

Evil Ed (1995)

Posted on February 15, 2019September 5, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Edward Tor Swenson (Johan Rudebeck) is editing dull swedish drama-films that nobody wants to see. When the former editor in the building’s “Splatter and Gore Department” became mad and stuffed a grenade in his mouth, Ed is set up to replace him, a task he would quickly regret. Ed gets his own, dark house in the woods where he sits through the newest film in a horror movie series called “The Loose Limbs”, which serves as a parody of all of the trashy horror sequels we got in the 1980’s. Ed becomes increasingly influenced by all the cruel violence he must sit through and it drives him crazy, or drives him “Evil Ed”, if you will. Now the world shall pay for making these influential garbage films, and he goes on a wild rampage.

Evil Ed is first and foremost a satire and spoof against the Cinemabureau of the State in Sweden that edited out explicit and gory scenes in horror movies to such an extent that it was only dry meat left. The scenes where the gory things happened would jump-cut right into the end of the scene. Not only did we miss the gory stuff, but also the whole context of the scenes. It looked choppy and messy and was irritating as hell. Those of us who grew up in the 80s and 90s, are aware of how horror movies on VHS were brutally treated by cencorship, especially in Norway (where I am from). They really showed no mercy to those poor celluloids, and even a scene in “Ghostbusters” were cut from the VHS in the norwegian release back in the day. Fortunately, things are different now.

With the cencorship history in the back of your mind, you will probably get more out of «Evil Ed», but this is still a fun little low-budget slasher made with lots of energy, enthusiasm, and a ton of horror references and cheesy dubbing. And music by E-Type, of course.

Director: Anders Jacobsson
Country & year: Sweden, 1995
Actors: Johan Rudebeck, Per Löfberg, Olof Rhodin, Camela Leierth, Gert Fylking, Cecilia Ljung, Michael Kallaanvaara
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0116247/