Jasmin sees a fist-sized hole in a brick wall. She’s hypnotically drawn to it and can’t focus on anything else. An increasingly morbid obsession begins, until the hole suddenly disappears.
O is a bizarre and creepy surreal horror short about addiction.
Director: Dominik Balkow
Writer: Dominik Balkow
Country & year: Germany, 2022
Actors: Nadine Scheidecker
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt17013484/
Emily Jenkins is a social worker who has been assigned to the case of 10-year-old Lillith Sullivan. It appears that some kind of emotional struggle has appeared between the little girl and her parents, and Emily suspects child abuse. She gets her suspicions well confirmed when Lillith’s parents actually try to kill her by putting her in the oven, Hansel & Gretel-style. The parents are, of course, placed in a mental institution while the most likely traumatized girl is sent to a children’s home. But she begs for Emily to look after her. And with her heart totally melted by this unfortunate, innocent little girl, Emily manages to get the board’s agreement of looking after her until a suitable foster family comes along. After Lillith moves in with Emily, strange things begin to happen. Maybe this little girl isn’t so innocent after all…
Case 39 is a supernatural horror thriller from 2009, directed by Christian Alvert. Upon its release, the reviews and overall reception was rather poor, and it barely managed to cover the budget of $26 million with a gross of $28.2 million. It was often being described as unoriginal and frightless, and thus, the expectations upon viewing it was rather low as I remember. Still, we found it to be a rather decent and suspenseful thriller, despite its unoriginality and lack of actual scares.
Like many “evil children” movies, the performances of the actual child actor is paramount for the viewing experience, and Jodelle Ferland (from Silent Hill and Tideland) does a very fine portrayal of the evil Lillith. While the movie totally lacks an actual mystery as it becomes quite apparent that the child is, in fact, evil incarnate, it still manages to be suspenseful enough to hold the entertainment value. The most creepy parts of the movie might be the very start, when Lillith is still with her parents and we get to wonder if there really is a case of domestic abuse here, or if it’s something else, only to be provided with a scene of the parents actually trying to bake their own child in the oven. Of course we know already at this stage that there’s something wrong with the child, but it’s still a pretty messed up scenario, especially considering that there have been cases of this actually happening in real life, like this rather grim case from 1984 where the parents claimed to have been “cooking Lucifer”. I wonder if this movie was a little inspired, perhaps.
As you can imagine, the movie centers around how Emily is gradually coming to realize what we, the viewers, already knew from the get-go: that Lillith is evil and also responsible for many of the horrible things happening around her, especially concerning another one of Emily’s cases with a young boy. Yeah, it’s often clichéd and not devoid of some tired jumpscares, but on the whole it works. So I’d say that Case 39, while suffering from predictability and very standard cinematography, redeems itself with a good construction of characters and gradual buildup of tension and suspense.
Director: Christian Alvart
Writer: Ray Wright
Country & year: Canada, US, 2009
Actors: Renée Zellweger, Jodelle Ferland, Ian McShane, Bradley Cooper, Callum Keith Rennie, Adrian Lester, Kerry O’Malley, Cynthia Stevenson, Alexander Conti, Philip Cabrita
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0795351/
Alley Oates is a well-respected psychic who’s received several prizes for helping the police solve crime mysteries over the years. Most of her job was to solve brutal crimes which involved children, which seems to have taken a toll on her mental health. Now she’s a deeply depressed, overweight (if she wasn’t already) middle-aged woman who spends her time burying herself in her bed under a mountain of blankets.
For some strange, bizarre reasons, this lady made me think of the nanny from Duckula. She’s got hands that could break coconuts, and I bet that her big, solid solid figure could easily crash through walls. Wouldn’t mess with her.
Anyways – life goes on as children are still missing and the local police need her help. A police man manages to drag her out of her hibernation cave to the the local basement morgue to unravel some dark mystery about three ghoulish corpse children. We learn that the bodies of the kids are possessed by some Asian demons called Kyoshi, and as they’re getting trapped in the basement, the ghoul juniors are about to wake up at any moment to get the schlock party started.
The Boneyard starts off with a dry and serious tone, more than it should, with static and boring dialogue scenes that didn’t leave the best first impression. But that starts to shift slightly when we enter the morgue and get introduced to the wacky receptionist, Miss Poopinplatz (lol) and her cute little poodle named Floofsoms. From here on, the film starts to loosen up and get more drunk as the silly, B-movie fun starts to set in.
Return of The Living Dead meets a very low-budget version of George Romero’s Day of the Dead is maybe the best way to describe this odd little film. The gore is very minimal here though, yet The Boneyard has several moments of solid fun value and special effects. The little kids who run around in their ghoulish rubber costumes add to the goofy charm. And then we have one of the characters who turns into an animatronic monster straight from Beetlejuice. The film rounds off with a crazy climax which could as well have been a deleted scene from Peter Jackson’s Braindead. Some name-dropping here, I know, but you get the point. Overall, it’s nothing spectacular but has its unique scenes and moments that make it an entertaining midnight watch. Ruff, ruff.
The Boneyard is on Blu-ray from 88 Films.
Writer and director: James Cummins
Country & year: US, 1991
Actors: Ed Nelson, Deborah Rose, Norman Fell, James Eustermann, Denise Young, Willie Stratford, Phyllis Diller, Robert Yun Ju Ahn, Richard F. Brophy, Sallie Middleton Kaltreider, Janice Dever, Cindy Dollar-Smith
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0101497/
After bringing home the ashes of her infant son, a mother begins to believe that there’s something alive inside of his urn.
Remains is a chilling and emotional horror short by Dylan Clark, who also made Portrait of God and Seagrass.
Director: Dylan Clark
Writer: Dylan Clark
Country & year: USA, 2023
Actors: Jennifer Taher, Will Walberg
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt27954433/
Here we have one of the more grimmer throwback horror-80s movies which seemed to be made by accident, or followed by a witness to an accident to be more correct. You see – other than producing their own low-budget horror films, the creative guys Jeremy Gillespie and Steven Kostanski from Astron-6 (Father’s Day, Manborg, Psycho Goreman and more) have also worked on bigger Hollywood films such as It, and Scary Stories to Tell in The Dark with special effects and art designs. They also worked with one of the greatest; Guillermo del Toro and Jeremy Gillespie was working at Pinewood studios where del Toro was in pre-production of his magnum opus which never happened: At the Mountains of Madness. After the project crashed and burned due to the high budget costs and the fact that del Toro refused to add in a love story and a happy ending to the studio’s demand, Gillespie and Kostanski got inspired to make their own low-budget spin on the story. And with their obsession for the 80s and the old school of filmmaking, it was natural to make it as a throwback.
It’s around past midnight when the small town sheriff, Daniel Carter (Aaron Pole), picks up a wounded guy on a rural road and takes him to the local hospital. Here we also meet our small group of characters, among them a cute young pregnant woman who’s about to give birth. And let’s hope that nothing bad happens to her and the baby (ha-ha). To bring this John Doe to the hospital seemed to be a very bad idea as weird things started to happen, such as the lights flickering and the phone shutting down. From here, it gets messy pretty quickly around the hospital when one of the nurses gets shot by the sheriff after she stabs the eyes of one of the patients . The lights shut down and the hospital gets surrounded by a group of cloak/hazmat suit-wearing cultists who have no intention of letting anyone get out of the building. Some ancient supernatural forces have also seemed to awaken in the basement which transforms dead people into the most grotesque-looking mutants that has been put on film in modern time.
It’s valid to mention that this is not an Astron-6 production which focuses more on humor, as this one has a far more serious tone. The Void is also crowdfunded on Indiegogo with a raise of only 82,510 dollars (!), which seems like a box of molded breadcrumbs for an ambitious Lovecraftian project like this. Having that said, the film looks pretty damn good with overall solid, creative filmmaking with a long string of clear inspirations from 70s and 80s classics. We have the siege element from John Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct 13, the claustrophobic paranoia from The Thing, the morbid, grotesque madness from Stuart Gordon’s From Beyond and the cryptic vibe and atmosphere from Lucio Fulci’s The Beyond, to mention some – all blended into its own unique, beefy and tasteful love letter for us older gorehounds. A great soundtrack by Blitz//Berlin which also suits the grim retro style perfectly like a penis in vagina. Except for some very few visual effects, there is no CGI here, only the usage of gallons of fake blood and sticky, top-tier latex monsters that could be something straight from 1987.
Writers and directors: Jeremy Gillespie, Steven Kostanski
Country & year: Canada, 2016
Actors: Aaron Poole, Kenneth Welsh, Ellen Wong, Kathleen Munroe, Daniel Fathers, Mik Byskov, Art Hindle, Stephanie Belding, James Millington, Evan Stern, Grace Munro
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt4255304/
Night of the Demon Bigfoot is an amateur monster schlock from 1980, which starts off with a wounded dude, Bill Nugent, lying in a hospital bed surrounded by doctors and a police inspector. He’s an anthropology professor, you see, and here’s his fascinating story you wouldn’t believe, which is about his adventure with a group of his students to track down Bigfoot in the woods of Northern California. And he has to convince the doctors that he’s not insane and that he was the only one who survived Bigfoot after the monster killed all of the students.
And good-fucking luck with that, my dude. Mr. Kallen from Slapped Ham would have loved to have you on his first podcast.
Bill starts with the first story, the first series of flashback scenes where we see Bigfoot killing random people. The first victim is some guy in the forest who’s getting ready to fish by a river. In order to have some suspense here, the monster is shown through POV and off-screen and, just like in the great classic Blackenstein, we have a moment where we see the monster rip his arm off with zero force in silhouette. Someone has clearly taken notes from the very best. While he bleeds to death with the use of the thinnest cranberry juice streaming from his ripped arm, the blood streams down to fill one of Bigfoot’s footprints, following the opening credits.
As Bill and his group of students head into the forest to find our mythic creature, they hear about this lady Wanda. She’s a mysterious outcast who lives as a hermit in a cabin deep in the woods, and the legend says that she knows where Bigfoot is. Okay, then. In the meanwhile, as they’re heading for Wanda’s cabin, we get some more flashback scenes told by Bill as they sit around the campfire to remind us how dangerous this Bigfoot is. All these campfire scenes were shot and added during the post production because the producer wanted to amp up the gore. We see Bigfoot killing people in different ways, but don’t get too excited. In one scene, he even uses an axe and the effect is the cheapest-looking rubber wound sticker they could afford.
The most memorable scene is the biker dude who gets his dick ripped off when he’s about to take a piss. Because this is no laughing matter. This is serious. Dead serious. Just look at the deadpan seriousness on Bill’s face when he tells the story. Don’t you dare to even chuckle or roll your eyes in disbelief. Show some respect for the poor guy.
We also have a campfire story about this random couple who’s about to have sex in a van. This is also the only body count flashback scene (as far as I remember) that was not shot in broad daylight. This is one of the more what-the-fuck-moments where the guy gets dragged by Bigfoot up to the top of the car while the lady can’t decide how to react as she makes orgasms sounds and looks confused rather than terrified. It’s noteworthy to mention that director James C. Wasson mainly produced porn films, so maybe there are some connections there.
Then there’s the star of the film, the man, myth and the legend himself: Bigfoot… and I have to be honest and say that the face-makeup is not the worst I’ve seen. Some effort went in here for sure, and I would assume the make-up artists took some inspiration from the creation of Michael Myer’s mask in Halloween, only here based on the face of Mick Jagger. And I don’t think anything can really top that.
Night of the Demon is available on DVD and Blu-ray from Severin Films, restored and uncut. A fun time for all lovers of schlock and funny-bad movies.
Director: James C. Wasson
Writers: Mike Williams, Jim L. Ball
Country & year: US, 1980
Actors: Michael Cutt, Joy Allen, Bob Collins, Jody Lazarus, Rick Fields, Michael Lang, Melanie Graham, Shannon Cooper, Paul Kelleher, Ray Jarris
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0081229/
A man comes upon a red bird house in the forest, and decides to leave a few bread crusts. Too bad he didn’t notice the “don’t feed the birds” sign…
Don’t Feed Them is a fun and hilarious horror short, with a pretty cool monster bird!
Director: Will McDaniel
Writer: Will McDaniel
Country & year: UK, 2023
Actors: Will McDaniel
Ambar is a young woman who tries to move from Mexico and settle in Cleveland, Ohio, after her mother passes away. Unfortunately, she’s an undocumented immigrant, which makes it incredibly hard to find a job and a place to live. She works at an “under the table” job, with an asshole boss who treats her like shit because he knows she doesn’t have much of a choice. In a desperate search for some place to stay, she finds a dilapidated boarding house where the owner, Red, doesn’t care about asking any questions as long as one month’s rent is paid up front. Shortly after she moves in, she starts experiencing strange things and sees ghostly figures. Some of the rooms in the house is also filled with strange artifacts, as Red’s parents were archaeologists. And to top it all, Red’s got a mentally disturbed brother who acts in a threatening manner. And while she isn’t the only woman in the house as there’s also two other young women renting a room there, Ambar soon feel that the supernatural visions and the overall threatening atmosphere in the house is becoming a bit too much…
No One Gets Out Alive is a supernatural horror film from 2021, directed by Santiago Menghini and based on an Adam Nevill novel by the same name. It premiered on Netflix on 29 September 2021. Now, while I have read some of Adam Nevill’s books I haven’t read this one, so on that part I’m unable to make any comparisons. I think this movie is a little bit of a modern gothic horror, set in a gloomy mansion-like boarding house where ghostly apparitions fit well in with the interior, so to speak. It’s atmospheric and offers mysteries and tension, which are not all caused by the supernatural affairs. Ambar’s experience as a lost, lonely and desperate young woman in a place where she basically has no value, and constantly in a situation where others might take advantage of her without repercussions, adds to the feeling if despair and tension. Even when Ambar befriends one of her colleagues who promises to get her a fake ID, she just ends up getting robbed by this woman whom she thought would help her. If Ambar hadn’t been in a very despairing situation, I don’t think the underlying tension would have been quite as effective.
The movie also hints that it exists in the same universe as The Ritual, as a newscaster mentions the four lost hikers in the Swedish woods. The Ritual is another book by Nevill which had a movie adaption released in 2017, and is currently also available on Netflix. Just like in The Ritual, there’s a god-like monster here. It isn’t particularly well explained, but it is some kind of Aztec goodess named Itzpapaloyl, which actually means “clawed butterfly” or “obsidian butterfly”. In Aztec religion, Itzpapaloyl is a fearsome skeletal death goddess. And just like in The Ritual, the monster design and effects are neat and otherworldly to the max, even if their display time is minimal.
Overall, No One Gets Out Alive is gloomy and creepy, where the heroine’s problems are just as much related to financial and social problems than just the supernatural ones. While it certainly isn’t fast paced I didn’t ever find it boring, and consider it a pretty enjoyable watch.
Director: Santiago Menghini
Writers: Jon Croker, Fernanda Coppel
Country & year: UK, 2021
Actors: Cristina Rodlo, Marc Menchaca, Vala Noren, Claudia Coulter, Teresa Banham, David Barrera, Alejandro Akara, David Figlioli, Cosmina Stratan
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt13056008/
It is the end of October in 1987, and it’s Halloween time! For some teenage girls in the small town of Vernon, things have gotten way too scary, however…Tiffany Clark, Marisa Song and Heather Hernandez are all killed by someone going by the nickname Sweet 16 Killer, each having been stabbed 16 times on the night of their 16th birthday. And they all had their birthdays in the days close to Halloween, of course: on October 27, 29 and 31. Many years later, to present day, the murders are still unsolved as the killer was never caught. Jamie Hughes is the daughter of a woman named Pam, who used to be friends with the three victims of the Sweet 16 Killer. Naturally, Pam is having a rather strained relationship to Halloween, and feels anxious when Jamie goes to a concert with her friend on Halloween night. While being at home giving out candy to the trick or treaters, Pam is suddenly attacked by the killer who seems to have come back for her all these years later, and she’s stabbed to death. While Jamie grieves over her mother’s death, she also helps her friend Amelia finish the final parts of her time machine (yes, an actual time machine), which Jamie later activates and is sent back to 1987. Realizing that she can now stop the Sweet 16 Killer from actually going on the killing spree, she tries to warn people (which goes as well as one might expect) and befriend her mother and her group of friends, hoping to stop the killer and save her mother from dying in the future. But she’s got to hurry – or else she will be trapped in 1987…
Totally Killer is a comedy slasher film from 2023, directed by Nahnatchka Khan. It premiered at Fantastic Fest on September 28, 2023, and was later released on Amazon Prime on October 6, 2023. I guess the best way to describe it is a movie where Scream meets Back to the Future. In the leading role we have Kiernan Shipka as Jamie(who also played Sabrina in the Netflix series Chilling Adventures of Sabrina), who plays a typical modern teenage girl. This is something that the movie makes sure to exploit when she gets sent back to 1987, where things are considerably less “politically correct” and Jamie often finds herself baffled by what was apparently deemed okay in the past. While this does sometimes come off as a bit overkill, I can’t help but feeling that this is probably exactly how a teenager of today would have experienced a trip to the latter part of the 80’s: constantly on edge by all the stuff that could potentially be offensive by someone or something. Whew.
Totally Killer is fast paced, generally fun and very much your typical teenage slasher flick. Already from the start it’s very upfront about what it is: a movie that’s supposed to be uncomplicated fun mainly aimed at teens. There is no excessive gore to be witnessed, but the violence is moderate and offers some bloody kills here and there. The killer is walking around wearing a Max Headroom-esque mask, which was made by makeup artist Tony Gardner.
Overall, Totally Killer is an entertaining horror comedy in the same vein as Happy Death Day: it’s nothing spectacular, but offers just the right amount of amusement which will make it a fun experience. There are some obvious plot holes, especially for those who might like to nitpick on things, but they don’t really overshadow the movie as a whole. Just bring forth your Halloween treats and some popcorn, and have fun!
Director: Nahnatchka Khan
Writers: David Matalon, Sasha Perl-Raver, Jen D’Angelo
Country & year: US, 2023
Actors: Kiernan Shipka, Olivia Holt, Charlie Gillespie, Lochlyn Munro, Troy Leigh-Anne Johnson, Liana Liberato, Kelcey Mawema, Stephi Chin-Salvo, Anna Diaz, Ella Choi, Jeremy Paul
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt11426232/
The Magician returns for a new holiday season, this time setting his sights on a group of old college friends celebrating Halloween. Will they give treats or will they get tricks?
Trick or Treat 2 is a fun Halloween horror short, and the sequel to Trick or Treat from 2021.
Director: Wesley Mellott
Writer: Wesley Mellott
Country & year: USA, 2022
Actors: Gary Paul Bowman, Danica Lee Clauser, Andrew Glessner, Andreas Quiroga
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt22012948/
