1980s horror movies – Horror Ghouls

Paganini Horror (1988)

Posted on October 15, 2025October 15, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

The year was somewhere in the late 1980s where the exciting news had spread in Italy that none other than Klaus Kinski was writing, directing and playing the main role in an upcoming biopic of the legendary violinist Niccolò Paganini. Since Klaus Kinski was still a crowd magnet, director Luigi Cozzi, expected Kinski’s film to be such a hit that a horror film based on Paganini could piggyback on its success. Instead, we have a nonsensical and laughable shiny turd of an amateur hour spectacle that could easily have been sharted out by Claudio Fragasso in a short week. Not that Kinski Paganini was a much better film, but that’s a whole other story, in a different genre.

Paganini Horror starts in the city of Venice with a girl who plays her violin through “The Witches Dance“ from a rare sheet of paper. These notes are of course cursed that makes the girl become possessed, then goes into the bathroom where her mother is taking a bath to drop a hair dryer in her water. FZZZZZZT, FZZZZZZT, added with some old-school cheesy hand-drawn electric effects.

Then we jump to our group of protagonists, an all-female rock n’ roll band (except for the drummer) who’s in the studio and recording. And no, the singer is not Peter Burns. The producer isn’t much impressed as she calls it the same old stuff and nothing original. She wants them to make something mind-blowing and sensational. Well, we’re still in the good ole’ 1980s, so that shouldn’t be that hard. The drummer, Daniel, then meets a mysterious man named Mr. Pinkett to exchange a black suitcase that holds the sheet of notes for… Paganini Horror! The combination of the suitcase is of course six, six…six. OoOoh… This Pinkett guy is played by Donald Pleasance where it’s hard to tell whether he’s completely buzzed-out or high as a kite.

Daniel plays the tune on a piano. The producer is finally impressed even though it fits way more in an Elton John ballad. Daniel says that the unpublished notes were written by Niccolo Paganini. Do you mean Paganini, the famous Italian violinist?, she ask like a braindead imbecile. No, Eilerti Paganini Pilarmi, who else? So let’s rock! The legend says that Paganini used these magical notes in a secret ritual while he sold his soul to the devil in exchange for fame and wealth. According to the real legend, Paganini did sell his soul to Dr. Satan but for talent and not for fame and wealth. Maybe not the best choice as he died piss-poor at age 57. Anyway, a light bulb flicks over their airheads as they believe that these tunes can bring the same success to them. The mind-numbingly bad acting as they look as excited and enthusiastic as some broken NPCs mixed with the stiff dubbing, is enough to give this extra cheese-filled spaghetti clown show a watch. And it gets better/worse.

Our girl band rents a remote castle to shoot a horror-themed music video. Meanwhile, we see this Pinkett guy throwing all the money from a tower while he’s mumbling

go, go, go, go all you little demons. Little demons. Yes, fly away, little demons, so that the real ones can take your place, so that what happened to Paganini will repeat itself this time as well. Let the price for fame be extracted by the one to whom it belongs, his majesty, Satan.

OK. So, uhm, the ghost of Paganini rises from the grave, I guess, to stalk and kill our female rockers one by one with a dagger that sticks out from the bottom of his small violin. Here he’s dressed more like a cheap cosplay version of the phantom of the opera, and is not even close to the awesome-looking ghoulish skeleton we see in the poster. There’s full-on nonsensical dream logic from here on where people randomly fall through green neon-lighted sinkholes, and…well, as we say in showbiz: The show must go on. Don’t have a script, you say? Then improvise! What follows is more retarded acting, cheap effects, cheaper costumes, baffling dialogue delivery and so on. You know the drill..

But to be fair though, the director Luigi Cozzi is not all to blame here. Cozzi was in constant fights with producer Fabrizio De Angelis, who always demanded Cozzi to cut as many gory scenes from the script as possible. Which is pretty odd considering that Fabrizio was also producer on the goriest films of Lucio Fulci throughout the 1980s. It sounded more like pure sabotage when Cozzi got this demand just a few days before the shooting started. He also planned an eight-minute long sequence with scenes of planets, galaxies and parallel dimensions that were supposed to give the movie a stronger “science fiction touch“. Paganini in space? Yeah, why not. This animated short film from Gobelins isn’t that far from the idea.

Cozzi picked the script apart until it was nothing more left to shoot, and most of the script had to be rewritten. Daria Nicolodi (the fresh ex-girlfriend of Dario Argento) then came into the picture to help him with the rewrite, and the next is Italian Trash Cinema history. Nicolodi also plays one of the main characters and she looks as brainfarted as the rest. If the original script and the overall technical aspects would be much better if hadn’t it been for the iron fist of De Angelis, we’ll never know. But if the acting was still as amateurish as in the version that got made, I hardly think so. Some fewer laughs, maybe.

Director: Luigi Cozzi
Writers: Luigi Cozzi, Daria Nicolodi, Raimondo Del Balzo
Country & year: Italy, 1988
Actors: Daria Nicolodi, Jasmine Maimone, Pascal Persiano, Maria Cristina Mastrangeli, Michel Klippstein, Pietro Genuardi, Luana Ravegnini, Roberto Giannini, Donald Pleasence
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095812/

The Gate (1987)

Posted on October 11, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

The movie opens with the nightmare of Glen, a 12 year old boy. He dreams that his home is abandoned, and he goes out to the backyard to enter his tree-house, where is gets struck by lightning. He wakes to a somewhat uncanny coincidence as he sees that some workers in the backyard have cut down the same tree. He and his friend Terry later discovers that the removal of the tree has unearthed a large geode, and at the same time Glen is catching a splinter and leaves a little bit of blood behind. And of course we know that this little detail is going to have some sort of significance later on…and yup, shortly afterwards some strange things start happening.

Then Glen’s parents are going to leave town for three days, and Glen’s older sister Alexandra (whom he refers to as Al for short) will look after him. Al, being a 15 year old girl, immediately gets in contact with her friends to make proper use of the situation and throws a party. While she’s partying with her friends downstairs, Glen and Terry are in Glen’s room. Terry’s brought with him his LP of a heavy metal band called Sacrifyx, as he found a booklet inside the vinyl album that describes some eerie resemblances to the hole in Glen’s backyard and the strange events that followed. They play the record backwards, which of course ends up opening the gate fully. Good work, lads. Downstairs, Glen and Terry discovers that Al and her friends are playing some sort of levitation game, and wants Glen to try it. At this point I was surprised they didn’t bring out a ouija board too just to out the cherry on top. Supposed to be just a silly game, Glen starts levitating for real, causing everyone to freak out. And that’s only the beginning. Something has started a chain of supernatural events, all of it in preparation for something bigger to come…

The Gate is a supernatural horror film from 1987, directed by Tibor Takács and written by Michael Nankin. The movie was a co-production between Canada and the United States, and has since its release gotten itself a cult following.

There are always some films you watch at an older age, and think “oh boy, I wish I’d seen that one when I was a kid“. The Gate is definitely one of those. It’s got all the perfect ingredients for a spooky movie that can be watched and enjoyed by a younger audience. The plot is somewhat simple: children discover that a gate to hell has opened in their backyard, and they must try to close it before all hell literally breaks lose. The kid characters are your typical “smarter than average and definitely smarter than the adults“ kind, which were often a thing in movies like this. Most interactions are between the protagonist Glen, his buddy Terry, and the sister Al, and their chemistry is fine. None of the characters are especially memorable, but they work for the setting.

The movie is using several techniques for the visual effects, including some good old-fashioned stop-motion animation, forced perspective, and of course the classic rubber suits. Ah, the good old 80’s. Towards the ending we get some really crazy scenes with all kinds of demonic and otherworldly elements, including tiny demons (which reminded me a bit of the subspecies in Subspecies), a zombie, and of course a big, big bad. And all of it because of a heavy metal band! Fits right in with the 80’s Satanic panic.

The Gate is a fun 80’s horror with lots of cool practical effects and the typical whimsical 80’s tone, filled with heavy metal, demons, practical and stop-motion effects. It’s one of those light-horror movies speckled with a lot of whimsical fantasy and fun times, never getting heavy in the gore or anything that could be considered particularly scary, which makes it work pretty good as a gateway horror. Fits fell with the title too, I guess.

In 1990, a sequel called The Gate II: The Trespassers was released. A 3D-remake was also scheduled to have a release in 2011, but nothing ever came of that.

Director: Tibor Takacs
Writer: Michael Nankin
Country & year: Canada, 1987
Actors: Stephen Dorff, Christa Denton, Stephen Dorff, Louis Tripp, Kelly Rowan, Jennifer Irwin, Deborah Grover, Scot Denton, Ingrid Veninger, Sean Fagan, Linda Goranson
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093075/

The Woman in Black (1989)

Posted on October 6, 2025October 6, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

It’s the fine year of 1925 and the place is a chronic depressive England where it’s always gloomy and misty and extra cozy by the fireplace. Arthur Kidd (played by Harry Potter’s dad, Adrian Rawlings) is a young solicitor in his early 30s. He’s married and has two children who he has to kiss goodbye for a while when his boss sends him from London to a small sleepy Greendale’ish coastal town. The first assignment is to attend the funeral of the mysterious upper-class woman Alice Drablow. And she was not the most popular person in town as only three, or so, is taking the last ta-ta before she gets lowered six feet under. RIP. The townsfolk refuse to talk about her as if she was some Voldermort.

Now the tedious work starts. And that is to visit Drablow’s gothic mansion, called Eel Marsh House, located by itself on an isle with a tidal causeway, and go through a mountain of papers. The old mansion, overgrown with vines and frozen in time, looks more welcoming than it should, but it doesn’t take long before the bad vibes creep in.

We don’t see much of the woman in black, but we absolutely feel her stone-cold presence, although most of the film happens during the daytime. And it actually works as the surroundings are bleak and ghostly by itself, where it doesn’t matter much if you spot a ghost at night or in broad daylight. That’s England for you.

The woman in black is played by Pauline Moran, who could as well be the sister of Jean Marsh. When we first see her outside the house where she gets the first direct eye contact with Arthur, she eyeballs him right through his sorry soul with sadness and burning radioactive hatred. She has that look as if someone just bent over and gave a big, bubbly, wet bean fart straight at her face. And once you’ve got eye contact with her, you’re, more or less, marked for life and will never be the same again, somewhat similar to a certain cursed Asian VHS tape from the 1990s.

There’s also a family graveyard by the house. Not subtle at all. So, of course, this place is haunted. But there’s work to do. Arthur gets a cute little dog, Spike, to keep him company as he dives more and more into her papers, going through cryptic tape recordings, to finally settle down the Eel Marsh House.

Then the good boy gets worried, runs out and disappears in the thick fog. As Arthur runs after him, he only hears screams coming from everywhere and the sounds of horses galloping. So what’s he gonna do? Take the train back to London and tell his cigar-smoking boss with a straight face that he got spooked away by ghosts? Of course not. And when the work is done it will finally be time to go back home to London, and hopefully forget about that creepy woman in black. But she won’t forget about you. Never. And no, nothing bad happens to the dog, so chill down.

The film is directed by Herbert Wise, based on the novel by Susan Hill. The script is written by Nigel Kneale, one of the most prolific screenwriters in the UK at the time. This is not your typical ghost ride with jump scares, loud music and so on, and certainly not for TikTokers with a half-second attention span. The Woman in Black is a classy ghost story, a tragic one as well, told in the old-fashioned style as the mystery of this Alice Drablow is basically told via letters and eerie tape recordings.

The film is very slow-burn’ish at times where we have some slick and elegant long one-shot takes so we can get a real sense of the place. The mood and the somber, gloomy cold atmosphere are the strongest elements here where with clever use of sound design, especially during the thick fog scenes. I also find it more effective that we see most of the woman in black at a distance where her sickly face is more blurred and obscured, which makes her look way more ghostly and mysterious. Makes me think of the cover of the first Black Sabbath record.

The film is also known for “that scene“ which alone was enough to ruin the whole Christmas for the Brits when it aired on the telly. The scene that really got me though, was the ending. So simple yet so damn chilling. As a low-budget movie made for TV, it surely looks impressive, still after 30-plus years, and the performances are solid.

Susan Hill was, of course, not particularly happy with the adaptation for small, eye-rolling nitpick reasons. One of which is that the screenwriter, Nigel Kneale, actually had the nerve to change the gender of Arthur’s dog! Ooof, oh my. Stephen King gives a pat on the shoulder as he relates.

After the film was shown on Christmas Eve in England 1989, followed by a quick VHS release, it disappeared, poof, like a ghost itself. It wasn’t until the 2000s that a DVD was released in Canada, a copy I bought myself before it eventually got out-of-print. The film finally got an official Blu-ray release in 2024 after a long, long, long copyright dispute. The rights were not owned by Susan Hill herself, but by a trinity of holy ghosts technicians: a make-up artist, a costume designer and an assistant director. What a headache.

The Woman in Black is also one of Guillermo Del Toro’s favorite haunted house films, which should be enough of a selling point. So don’t listen to me. The 2012 version, produced by Hammer Films with Daniel Radcliffe in the main role, is also a good one.

Director: Herbert Wise
Writer: Nigel Kneale
Country & year: UK, 1989
Actors: Adrian Rawlins, Bernard Hepton, David Daker, Pauline Moran, David Ryall, Clare Holman, John Cater, John Franklyn-Robbins, Fiona Walker, William Simons
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098672

Waxwork (1988)

Posted on October 4, 2025October 4, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Two college students, Sarah and China, have a strange encounter with an odd gentleman who owns a mysterious wax museum and invites them to have a look at the exhibit. Later, they bring along with them some of their friends: Mark, Gemma, James, and Tony. The museum has a lot of morbid displays, but nothing suspicious about that, it’s just the perfect ghoulish fun any horror wax museum should have. But of course, there’s something sinister at play…and the college students soon find out that if they get too close to an exhibit, they will end up in a pocket dimension where the scene unfolds in real life. Tony ends up in a werewolf exhibit where he encounters a hunter and his son, who is there to kill the creature. There’s no surprise that this doesn’t end well for Tony. China is sent to a castle where none other than Count Dracula himself turns her into a vampire. Mark and Sarah, however, never gets too close to any of the exhibits, and leave the museum while wondering where the hell their friends are at. Soon, they both realize something is very wrong with the museum, and they even try to make the police intervene. You can probably guess how that goes. Still, the museum has a lot more in store for its visitors…a lot more!

Waxwork is a comedy horror film from 1988, written and directed by Anthony Hickox in his directorial debut. It is partially inspired by Waxworks, a German silent film from 1924.

Waxwork is a very good mix of horror and comedy, where the tone is overall very whimsical but also offers a nice amount of decent gore scenes. It’s quite campy at times, but that only works in the movie’s favor. The practical effects here are pretty good, which shouldn’t come as much of a surprise when Bob Keen was brought on board to work on the visuals effects. His special effects can also be seen in other horror movies like Hellraiser (1987), Lifeforce (1985), among several more. Like a typical teen-slasher, though, the movie is set up with a lot of teen characters you couldn’t really give a fiddle about. So don’t expect any great in-depth personalities or anything…most of them are just there to get killed off by the exhibits. There is also a pretty bonkers finale, filled with chaos and absurd fun!

Some familiar faces can be seen here, including Zach Galligan as Mark, who is most known for his role in Gremlins (1984), David Warner as the Waxwork man, known for his roles in many films and series, including Omen (1976), In the Mouth of Madness (1994), Ice Cream Man (1995) and many more. And there’s also Mihaly ‘Michu’ Meszaros who is most known for a full-body costume role where you’d never recognize him: ALF aka “Gordon Shumway“! Aside from some well-known actors, the movie includes a ton of references to many horror icons among the exhibits “coming to life“: there’s a werewolf, vampires, a Golem, a mummy, Frankenstein’s Monster, Jack the Ripper, and so much more! Even Marquis de Sade, a real-life french nobleman who was, and still is, notorious for his writings and from where the term Sadism stems from. Whether or not he was just a depraved monster or a misunderstood genius in a whole other debate, though, but in this movie he’s one of the major villains.

Waxwork is one of those 80’s horror movies where you just sit back, and more or less nods to yourself and thinking “yup, this is one of those movies that could only have been made back in the day“. Easily a typical comfort-horror. A nice 80’s horror film filled with nonsense of the fun and ghoulish kind!

Writer and director: Anthony Hickox
Country & year: USA, 1988
Actors: Zach Galligan, Jennifer Bassey, Joe Baker, Deborah Foreman, Michelle Johnson, David Warner, Eric Brown, Buckley Norris, Dana Ashbrook, Micah Grant, Mihaly ‘Michu’ Meszaros, John Rhys-Davies
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096426/

Phantasm II (1988)

Posted on October 2, 2025October 4, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

BooooOOOOY and GiiiiIIIIRL !

Almost a decade flew away among the cocaine leftover dust during the 1980s before a sequel was made. In the meantime, Don Coscarelli made the sword & sorcerer flick The Beastmaster (1982) and had no desire to make another horror movie. That was until some producer at Universal Studios finally saw Phantasm, lit a fat cigar, poured a glass of whiskey, gave Coscarelli a call, and said: That cliffhanger, bro! I’ll give you a budget of 3 million dollars so you can make a sequel. There was only one demand and that was to either replace A. Michael Baldwin or Reggie Bannister. Coscarelli couldn’t in his wildest imagination picture someone else as Reggie as… Reggie. Who could. It would be like replacing Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams, and I bet Coscarelli saw that right on. Don’t touch the ponytail. So the sacrifice went to Baldwin, a decision that made him very bitter for decades to such an extent that he just pretended that the movie didn’t exist. Or maybe he was just mad because he missed the opportunity to make out with Paula Irvine. His replacement went to James Le Gros, who was chosen over Brad Pitt. I’ll admit it was very distracting at first, since he looks eons apart from Baldwin. But hey, that’s just showbiz.

This is the first film Reggie Bannister appeared in since the first Phantasm. In the meantime, he worked at a… funeral home. Of course. He hasn’t changed much during the nine years. He slips into the role and his chill mannerism as if it was yesterday, or I’d just assume that he’s one of those unique actors who can just play themselves. The same goes for Angus Scrimm, who really embraced playing the character of The Tall Man as much he loved the “phans“ of the franchise.

Phantasm II starts right off after the first ended. Mike’s brother Jody is dead after dying in a car crash. Mike is convinced that was because of The Tall Man. Reggie tries to comfort him while the fireplace is lit in the background, saying it was just a car crash and The Tall Man is not real. After losing both his parents and now his big brother, Reggie suggests that they should hit the road and get a fresh start. The Tall Man is suddenly behind Mike and captures him in his bedroom, after his iconic line BooooOOOOY! As the evil Jawa-looking dwarfs, called Lurkers, pop out of everywhere, Reggie turns up the gas stoves, saves Mike at the last second and jumps out a window before we have one of the most epic house explosions in a horror movie.

Then we skip seven years later where Mike has spent his time in a psych ward. He finally gets released after lying to the doctor by saying that everything was in his head. Sarah Connor frowns. Mike then celebrates his new freedom by visiting Disneyland. Just kidding – he goes straight to Morningside Cemetery to find three empty coffins. Reggie pops up, and he’s disappointed that Mike still hasn’t realized that it was all in his head. Yeah, someone is in some deep denial here, or, whatever. Mike also has some telepathy connections with a blonde girl, Liz (Paula Irvine), who also is on a mission to take down The Tall Man. Because her grandpa is on the deathbed and, to quote the boogeyman’s own words, You think that when you die, you go to Heaven. You come to us!, she doesn’t want The Tall Man to claim him. Of course not. That must have been the greatest grandpa.

Mike begs Reggie to help him. But the priorities have changed since last time as he’s gotten married and has a daughter. He drives Mike home to meet his family, only to get met with the sight of his house being blown to pieces. By who? Take a guess. RIP to Reg’s family that we never got to meet. Well, there’s no reason now to not join forces, hit the gas, loot some weapons, and hunt down the prime evil himself.

Along the way, they pick up a young woman, Alchemy (Samantha Phillips). And…she’s a weird bird and Reggie is drooling all over her. Hey, Reg, you’re a good guy, but your wife and daughter just died. Some cope with grief differently, I guess. They have a bizarre sex scene where Reggie does all in his power to not touch her naked breasts. That’s because Reggie’s real-life wife was on the set that day. Ooof. It took six hours to shoot that short scene. Must have been torture. Samantha Phillips didn’t understand the script at all (can’t blame her) and why the hell her character just wanted to have sex with a random bald guy. Coscarelli, the genius that he is, said: You have a fetish for bald heads. Oki-doki then. There’s, of course, something more to her than just being an excuse to shoehorn a sex scene.

We get introduced to Reggie’s iconic signature weapon, the Quadruple-barrel shotgun, as he segways himself to become the wholesome action hero of the franchise. Here, he only uses the shotgun once before he just throws it away. We get more blasting in the next film though.

Phantasm II offers a more action vibe with some road-movie elements in purest Supernatural-style. The plot is more straight-forward, and, of course, more gory. Reggie did all his stunts himself, except in the epic chainsaw fight scene. The bigger budget shows, as we also have bigger scale set-pieces and more technical abilities. The atmosphere is way more ghoulish where we have the most sinister-looking mausoleum that was built for the film where one can smell the eeriness. The spheres have gotten some mods, like a laser beam and a little blade to chop off ears. I bet Robotnik is a bit jealous.

The effects are done by veterans like Greg Nicatero and Robert Kurtzman, where we have a grotesque Tall Man minion-puppet that sure would have caused some serious back pain. A sphere flies through someone’s body and almost through the mouth. Awesome stuff. James Le Gros as Mike took its time to get used to. He does an alright job. Nothing too special. Reggie and Angus Scrimm steals the show. This Liz character, however, seemed pretty pointless, and so did the psychic power elements, which are completely gone in the next films. But again, that’s Phantasm for you. Don’t look much for logic, just enjoy the ride.

Phantasm II is regarded as the best one in the series, like a handful of other second films in a horror franchise. But one particular individual that didn’t like it and gave it a one star, was the one and only, Roger Ebert, who had this interesting take:

―The target audience for “Phantasm II” obviously is teenagers, especially those with abbreviated attention spans, who require a thrill a minute. But why would images of death and decay seem entertaining to them? For the same reason, I imagine, that the horror genre has always been attractive to adolescents. They feel immortal, immune to the processes of aging and death, and so to them these scenes of coffins and corpses represent a psychological weapon against adults. Kids will never die. Only adults will die. ―

It’s fair to assume that Ebert had some serious thanatophobia (fear of death). Nothing wrong with that. We all have our phobias. But maybe that explains why he notoriously hated horror movies so much and despised watching them since it was a part of his job. RIP.

Writer and director: Don Coscarelli
Country & year: USA, 1988
Actors: James Le Gros, Reggie Bannister, Angus Scrimm, Paula Irvine, Samantha Phillips, Kenneth Tigar, Ruth C. Engel, Mark Major, Rubin Kushner
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095863/

Prequel:
– Phantasm (1979)

Sequel:
– Phantasm III (1994)

Slugs (1988)

Posted on September 2, 2025September 2, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

The summer ain’t over yet, cause here they come – the slugs! Thousands of slugs slime their way up from lakes, sewers, and toilets to eat people in a small American town, all from alcoholics, horny teenagers to rich soap opera snobs. And before you know it, the slugs are everywhere. They slime, they ooze, they kill. Slugs, slugs, slugs! My oh my… The local sheriff must come up with a smart plan to save the day. There you have this cheesy, silly, slimy low-brow Spanish/American-produced creature-feature in a nutshell. Nothing more, nothing less. But are slugs really harmful though? Let’s ask Mr. Google:

– Considering that you are a rational human being who doesn’t put slimy, gross bugs into your mouth, this shouldn’t be a problem. It may, however, be an issue for your pets. Cats and dogs that consume slugs may suffer from excessive drooling and or vomiting. Beyond this, slugs are not harmful, Google says.

Allrighty then. So, what are we gonna do with those damn slugs? And speaking of animals, did you also know that hedgehogs eat slugs as if it was candy? This would be like a buffet heaven for the Sonics. Anyway…

What makes the movie worth a watch are the effects and just the overall silliness. And if you appreciate some funny-bad acting, there are some laughs to be had here. There isn’t much more to say really. It’s pretty straight-forward where NPC’s are getting eaten by slugs, one by one. Some slime their way into garden gloves to chew on someone’s hands, while others hide in the food to get swallowed so they can eat their victims from the inside out. Gnarly. Slugs is directed by the Spanish gore & schlock master Juan Piquer Simón, who’s most known for Pieces (and the bizarre clown show that is Extra Terrestrial Visitors), so that alone should say a few things. The film is also known as Slugs The Movie since it’s based on a book by the splatter-punk horror writer Shaun Hutson. And after he saw the film he had a clear verdict: – Do yourselves a favor a don’t bother watching it, it’s awful! – He has later viewed the film as a guilty pleasure.

Slugs is available on Blu-ray from Arrow Video, and as for now, it slimes around on Tubi.

Director: Juan Piquer Simón
Writers: Ron Gantman, José Antonio Escrivá, Juan Piquer Simón
Also known as: Slugs The Movie
Country & year: USA/Spain, 1988
Actors: Michael Garfield Levine, Kim Terry, Philip MacHale, Alicia Moro, Santiago Álvarez, Concha Cuetos, John Battaglia, Emilio Linder, Kris Mann, Kari Rose, Manuel de Blas, thousands of slugs
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093995/

The New York Ripper (1982)

Posted on August 15, 2025August 15, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

There’s a serial killer on the loose in the city of New York. What else is new?

It all starts simple enough like a classic detective crime story when a dog fetches a severed hand to his owner during a walk by the Hudson River. As we see a clear close-up of the dog having the hand in its mouth, the image freezes as the intro credits rolls over some cheesy jazz music, taken from the vinyl collection of Umberto Lenzi. Then we meet Lieutenant Fred Williams who’s on the case. He’s a chain-smoking apathetic soon-to-retire cold fish of a guy who fucks hookers and probably reeks strong odors of tobacco mixed with some cheap cologne a mile away. Not the most sympathetic individual, but nor are the rest of the people we meet here. Welcome to New York and enjoy the smell. But I’d never leave the city without at least tasting the pizza.

The kills escalate in more brutal ways when young women around Manhattan are getting butchered, the one in a more brutal way then the other. Already six minutes in we have one of the many red-herrings when a woman accidentally bumps into some dude’s car with her bicycle, where we also have some stiff n’ cheesy (dubbed) dialogue:

– Goddammit, why can’t you watch where you’re going??

– I’m sorry, I was thinking of Boston. (Eh, huh? Ok.)

– You women should stay home where you belong! You’re a menace to the public! And you got the brains of a chicken!!!

– And you’re an asshole. Ciao.

After they both go on board the Staten Island Ferry, our Boston lady takes a little revenge by writing “SHIT“ with her lipstick on his windshield while he’s probably in the toilet and jerking off. You go, girl! In pov view we see someone approaching the lady and catches her in the act. We assume that’s an off-duty police officer only until the person speaks gibberish in a Donald Duck voice before the girl gets stabbed to death. From here on it snowballs into a messy whodunnit sleaze-fest mystery where we jump from one character to the next, until we have so many shady faces to suspect as the killer that you’ll lose count.

One could argue that Lucio Fulci just saw Maniac (another New York based serial killer film from 1980) while he scoffed, took a sip of his red vine and said to himself while waving his hands enthusiastic like a true Italian: This is kids stuff. I can turn up the sleazyness all up to eleven, or maybe even higher! And with that said, this is not your typical Lucio Fulci dish that’s usually served with tons of maggots, slimy corpses spiced with cobweb-filled ghoulish scenery. This is a way more grounded detective/crime story that is quickly to be overstuffed with sleaze, nudity, softcore scenes, a bizarre toe-banging-rape scene, and a series of graphic kills that was more than enough keep the filmed banned in the UK until 2002. But even though the maggots are absent, The Big Apple is rotten to the core, where you could more or less say the citizens themself are the maggots, as misanthropic as it sounds. Because the film treats all the characters as worthless scum as if they have zero value to the society, and Lucio Fulci makes damn sure to kill them in such a way that it leaves as little as possible to the imagination.

Then we also have the grimy, urban and decaying environments of New York that mirrors the drained-out empty shells of the characters with their broken dreams and lonely beds. We also follow a mysterious upper-class lady who’s in the audience of a Live Sex Show where she hits a small tape recorder so her husband can jerk-off to the couples moaning sounds. That’s how creative we had to be decades before the internet. This woman is also a pathological nymphomaniac who fucks around with shady dudes in the city. There’s no empathy to find here. Only desperate and compulsively-driven desires to fill the next sexual/fetish cravings, whether it is a quick load with hookers, or chasing young ladies through graffiti-filled subway trains where I guess the stench of piss and shit is soaked in the air like a sponge. The New York Ripper is co-written by Gianfranco Clerici, who also shaped Ruggero Deodato’s House on the Edge of the Park (1980), so that alone should tell what kind of a dark alley this is. Even though the effects isn’t always as convincing as on paper, the nature of the killings are as grisly as it can get. Throats get sliced, nipples and eyeballs gets cut in half (Takashi Miike took notes) and a broken glass bottle gets shoved into someones vagina. All in pure classic giallo-style, of course.

The sexual aspects is here for a reason and not just added as just a meaningless shock value, even though the film goes so far in some certain scenes that you can’t avoid speculating if Lucio Fulci just wanted to make a straight-up porn film instead. The motives of the killer is as bizarre as the demented Donald Duck voice, but that’s giallo for you. Some shoddy dubbing and cheesy use of jazz music may cause some unintentional chuckles. But underneath those hiccups The New York Ripper is mean-spirited, nihilistic and misogynistic to the bone. Sick and morbid entertainment for sick and morbid people. Plain and simple. Fulci nods proudly in his grave. And if you’re easily offended when it comes to simulated violence against women, I’d rather put on a film like Blood Sucking Freaks (1976). I’m sorry, that was rude and unemphatic of me to say. The film has gotten several uncut releases during the last 10-15 years and got a 4K Ultra HD release from Blue Underground in 2020.

Director: Lucio Fulci
Writers: Gianfranco Clerici, Vincenzo Mannino, Lucio Fulci, Dardano Sacchetti
Country & year: USA/Italy, 1982
Actors: Jack Hedley, Almanta Suska, Howard Ross, Andrea Occhipinti, Alexandra Delli Colli, Paolo Malco, Cinzia de Ponti, Cosimo Cinieri, Daniela Doria
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084719/

Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (1981)

Posted on July 18, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Here we have a lost little gem that was buried among the endless wave of the 80s formulaic slasher craze, and was rediscovered eons later. And with a strange nursery rhyme’ish title like Butcher Baker, Nightmare Maker, it’s not too easy knowing what to expect. Then we also have the alternative VHS title Night Warning and that blood-drenched poster with the shortened title Butcher Baker. Not to mention the slightly cryptic trailer posted below. So… is this about a mad cocaine-snorting butcher who terrorizes vegans in their dreams, or something? I’m almost tempted to just say yes… ha-ha.

The film centers around the not-so-healthy relationship between aunt Cheryl (Susan Tyrrell) and her nephew Billy (Jimmy McNichol). She once adopted him after his parents died in a brutal Final Destination-style car accident, the most graphic moment in the film as the breaks suddenly won’t work and the car rolls in towards a log truck. The outcome speaks for itself. Now, in the present day, Billy is soon to have his 17th birthday and plans to move to the University of Denver after he gets offered an athletic scholarship. Good news, right? Not for aunt Cheryl, not in the slightest. Because Cheryl wants her baby-boy all to herself. And because she’s sacrificed everything for him, he now owes her, said no one but Cheryl. Yes, she’s one of those with her own dusty copy of Guilt-Trip Textbook for Narcissistic Parents, finally ready to come into use. Run and never, ever look back. Easier said than done when Cheryl has done her part of grooming him into believing that crossing over some intimate boundaries, that would get everyone’s skin crawling, is completely normal. Her delusion and borderline fantasy world that she’s built up in her sick head over the many years starts to crack fully open when she finally realizes that he’s also moving to the university with his girlfriend, Julia.

So, in order to cope and not let the mask slip, while she actually let the mask fall off completely at turbo-speed, she gets into panic mode and tries to seduce Phil, the TV operator. Because she needs a new man in her life, and she needs one now! And things go completely off the rails from here on as the mating ritual (for lack of a better term) ends up with Cheryl grabbing a kitchen knife and making a bloody mess by stabbing the guy to death. And in comes Billy. This is also his 17th birthday, and all. Yay! “He tried to rape me“, she screams hysterically. And the Earth is flat. Another one who doesn’t buy that story, but for whole other reasons, is the detective Jo Carlson (Bo Svensson). Because Phil was in a secret gay relationship with Billy’s baseball coach, Tom, and detective Carlson suspects Billy to have been in a threesome relationship with these two. He has some valid reasons to actually believe that though. But Carlson is first and foremost a dedicated homophobe and a pompous sociopath who only views Billy as a worthless fag who he’d love to throw in jail. In the meantime, Cheryl is in a full mental collapse as she cuts her hair, starts to poison Billy’s milk with strong sedatives to keep him bedridden, and declares war on everyone who dares coming in her way to keep Billy for herself.

It must be said that the film is far from as gory as the impression may give. Butcher Baker was added on the overhyped joke-list in Britain that is the Video Nasty where it’s easy to assume that it was banned just because of the poster alone, not so unlikely what happened with The Driller Killer (1979) after this cover art was used on the VHS release. The film was also banned in Norway, my home country. So with that being said, this is not your typical straight-forward teen-slasher, but more of a morbid psychological drama sprinkled with taboo and touchy subjects that will be as fresh and relevant until the end of mankind. While the subjects itself are dark and disturbing enough, the tone and execution is way more whackier, if not bonkers, than it maybe should be. But somehow it works. One can analyze the deeper meanings and themes that lies under the surface to the next nuclear winter, but the most important here is that Butcher Baker, Nightmare Maker is overall an amusing, entertaining semi-slasher with some great eccentric energy. Much thanks is to Susan Tyrrell as the mentally unhinged and raving mad aunt Cheryl. She gives a pretty unique, zany and explosive performance to such a threatening level that I bet that the co-actors must have felt seriously intimidated by her. And I can’t unsee the Mia Goth likeness. She’d be perfect in a Butcher, Baker, Nightmare ReMaker. Bo Svensson as detective Carlson also made me chuckle at some moments, because he’s so over-the-top stereotypical and full of burning hatred against gay people that’s it’s almost comical. Chill.

Butcher Baker is on Blu-ray from Severin Films, and for time being, on Tubi.

Director: William Asher
Writers: Steve Breimer, Alan Jay Glueckman, Boon Collins
Also known as: Night Warning, Butcher Baker
Country & year: USA, 1981
Actors: Jimmy McNichol, Susan Tyrrell, Bo Svenson, Marcia Lewis, Julia Duffy, Britt Leach, Steve Eastin
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082813/

Robowar (1988)

Posted on July 11, 2025August 14, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

This Italian-produced Predator ripoff starts in the midst of a full-blown bulletstorm mayhem in the jungle of the Philippines, and a group of commandos are sent to the green inferno to see what the hell is going on. We meet the four trigger-happy testosterone-filled walking ballsacks with the colorful code names Killzone, Blood, Papa, Diddy Bop and Quiang. And together they make the team called BAM, which stands for (yeah, you already guessed it) Bad Ass Motherfuckers. Can’t get more 1980s than that. They stumble upon fresh-fried corpses as they explore the territories. They rescue a damsel-in-distress from getting chased by a group of horny guerrillas. She is a young, blond nurse who goes by the name… Virgin. Sounds like she’s in the wrong movie, no?

Anyway – As they go deeper in the jungle, things start to smell more cheesy, as they’re getting hunted by an alien-looking killer robot, called ~~Predator~~ Omega One. He’s a high-tech renegade humanoid who shoots the deadliest lasers through an arm cannon and wears a silly costume where a biker helmet was used to give him the flair of RoboCop, another well-known film you’ve maybe heard of. Instead, we have just another thick layer of cheese. Now it starts to smell. And his appearance is as intimidating as…someone who has dressed up to attend a Halloween party at the local gay bar. To build up some suspense and tension, we see from his POV perspective through his lousy, low-pixelated sensor while he mumbles gibberish like a demented Indian scammer on crack cocaine. So, come get some!

Robowar is directed by schlock maestro of Italian Trash Cinema Bruno Mattei (here under his most used pseudonym as Vincent Dawn), written by the couple Rosetta Drudi and Claudio Fragasso. Fragasso also got the honor of playing the RoboPredator, which made him faint two times during the shoot due to the extreme heat. Claudio Fragasso also did the most Claudio Fragasso thing to shoot a random sequence without zero context to the rest of the film. Of course. Robowar was originally meant to just be a Vietnam-war film, inspired by Apocalypse Now (1979), shot in the hot n’ sticky Philippines and all, but when Mattei saw Predator during a lunch break, he did what he usually did: put in elements of said film to cash in on its current success. And we can only imagine what the film would look like if he had also played Contra. That being said, Mattei had already made the war film Commando Strike the year before, also in the Philippines, where I guess the leftovers of ammo, cheese, testosterone and set pieces to blow up were enough to fill Robowar. Mattei also made Commando Strike 2 the same year, aka Trappola diabolica. So yeah, Signor Mattei sure got to make his epic war films, one of which by coincidence became a Predator ripoff, and one of the mockbuster films I bet that The Asylum wish they had made some 30 years ago. And that alone says it all.

Some quoteworthy (white) lines:

– Fuck it, Diddy. Quit moving around like you’re jerking off, you’re making me seasick.

– Why do they have nicknames?
– You should know what the group is called. “BAM”.
– BAM?
– Big Ass Motherfuckers!

– Drug addicts and fags. I bet they got AIDS too, huh, Quang?

– Technology hasn’t got feelings! (I bet that Jason Blum does not agree on that one, bwhahahahaha…!)

Director: Bruno Mattei
Writers: Claudio Fragasso, Rossella Drudi
Original title: Robot da guerra
Country & year: Italy/Philippines, 1988
Actors: Reb Brown, Catherine Hickland, Massimo Vanni, Romano Puppo, Claudio Fragasso, Luciano Pigozzi, Max Laurel, Jim Gaines, John P. Dulaney, Mel Davidson
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096000/

Crawlspace (1986)

Posted on April 25, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

– You’re just inches away from a fate worse than death. And that is directing Klaus Kinski!

It should be a big red flag when you have an old weirdo named Karl Gunther who owns an apartment complex which he only rents out to young women. And especially when he looks like Klaus Kinski. But there’s nothing shady about him, how could there be with those blue, warm and kind eyes? He only likes to kill some time by crawling around the air vents like a rat and spying on the tenants while they do their daily things, like having girls parties with tequila mixed with milk (yuck), and dates with cringe sex acts. Because when you couldn’t stalk people through social media and webcams, like today, you had to be more creative and use your imagination, like this Gunther guy.

And in his secret little attic apartment he has his small collection of bodyparts in jars, building death traps, and where he writes his secret journal while he has a cute, little white kitty to keep him company. And don’t worry, nothing bad happens to the cat… ha-ha. He also has an another pet, and that is a woman trapped in a cage who has gotten her tongue cut off. Between the killings, Gunther plays Russian Roulette as a form of self-punishment. If the bullet goes off, well, it’s game over. If not, so be it, and over to the next victim. As Gunther does his normal business by stalking and murdering his female tenants one by one, he, one day, gets an unexpected visit by a young man who’s about to expose his dark and shady past, which explains one thing or ten about Gunther’s murder tendencies. You can be happy to confront him, by all means, but not sit too comfy in his chairs…

And if the building looks somewhat familiar, it’s because it’s the same set-design used in Troll the same year. But the real troll in this place, is none other than the goblin, the myth, the monster himself: Klaus Kinski.

Crawlspace is written and directed by David Schmoeller and produced by Charles Band’s Empire Pictures. And of course, talking about this particular film is impossible without diving into the behind-the-scenes madness, which is more entertaining than the film itself. Because David Schmoeller was highly excited to work with Klaus Kinski, after watching him in the great Werner Herzog films. To do some quick background checks on Kinski, David Schmoeller contacted the previous director he worked with (Ulli Lommel, I’d guess). He said that Kinski was wonderful to work with and nothing but a good experience. Had he spoken with Herzog instead, God knows how that conversation would have turned. In other words: He was completely oblivious to what kind of a deranged madman he really was and the radioactive shitstorm that would follow him. It wasn’t after he read an interview with him in the Playboy Magazine that he knew that he was in big trouble. “Oh…“. Yeah, you can say. Enjoy the Klaus Kinski Crazy Train!

On day three of shooting, Kinski went on full war with the crew that escalated into six fist fights. And that’s just him warming up. He refused to follow basic orders, such as start acting when hearing “action“. He would instead scream and yell: Action! Action! Action! I’ve made over 200 movies and directors always saying action! So, instead of “action“, Schmoeller said: Light, camera, roll … Klaus. That form of ego boost worked for a day and a half until Kinski suddenly started screaming again. Klaus, Klaus, Klaus..! All my life, directors have called Klaus! … facepalm.

So, if the director couldn’t say “Klaus“ to start the scene, what should he say then? Kinski replies: Say nothing. I start when I’m ready. Alright then. But the madness is far from over. Because after Schmoeller says “cut“, Kinski screams again and yells: Cut! Cut! Cut! I’ve made over 200 movies and the directors are always saying cut! He points at the director and says: Don’t say cut. I stop when I’m finished.

Kinski would never do a take two, because why should he. He was the best, after all, he just always happened to be surrounded by a bunch of mongoloid amateurs ( the viewpoint by none other than Kinski, der meister himself ). According to the commentary track by writer/director David Schmoeller on the Blu-ray, Kinski would cut lines and refuse to say certain important plot-related dialogues which Schmoeller assumed he just forgot. He would reply with I didn’t forget, I just didn’t need to say it. The only way Kinski would say these lines was after Schmoeller had to go to him and say You know what, Klaus, I don’t think you need to say this next line. Kinski would then disagree and say Yes, I do. It’s an important line. Bro, talking about pure tiresome childish mindgame fuckery mixed with a handful of deep-rooted borderline narcissism. But a big thanks to the goldmine of funny trivia.

Due to all the Kinskiness, the twenty days-shooting schedule had to be extended by ten days. They also had to have some of the crew members on his tail when he was out for lunch, like a wild dog on a leash, so they could bring him back to set to finish the movie. Because hiring Klaus Kinski was far from cheap where his name alone was a big selling point, and there was no budget to replace him. And speaking of hiring Klaus Kinski and the risk that he would sabotage the whole film, listen to this: The Italian producer, Roberto Bessi, actually wanted to kill off Klaus Kinski so that they could have his insurance money. Yes, really. David Schmoeller made a short documentary in 1999 titled Please, kill Mr. Kinski where he goes more in detail. This was not the first time someone behind the scenes wanted to delete him though. During the making of Fitzcarraldo (1982) one of the natives offered director Werner Herzog to kill Kinski. Herzog wisely decline, because, well, he needed the bastard to finish the film. And the same said David Schmoeller as he also was hellbent to survive the Kinski Crazy Train, because that in itself is always worth a golden medal.

I really hope that some day a biopic of him gets made, because the sheer absurdity that was the demented world of Klaus Kinski is something that no one could make up, not even Chris Chan. Just watch the five films he made with Werner Herzog, the documentary My Best Fiend Klaus Kinski, his insane directorial acid-trip delirium Kinski Paganini, which also became his last film before he died of a heart attack in 1991 at age of 65. Then we have a series of his bizarre public outbursts, and the cultural trainwreck fiasco that was his short-lived tour as Jesus Christ Savior that was canceled after one show because he couldn’t keep himself together. And that’s just the surface. Because when you dig deeper into the Klaus Kinski iceberg, we also have the sexual abuse/rape/incest allegations, which is a whole horror story by itself for a Netflix miniseries. Bill Skarsgard would be a great choice to play Klaus Kinski.

Uhm, what the hell was I originally talking about… yeah, Kudos to David Schmoeller for being able to end up with a polished-looking film, considering the circumstances. It has some stylish qualities with some slick camerawork and cinematography, especially during the last act where Kinski chases the final girl through the crawlspaces on a trolley. Despite the behind-the-scenes insanity, Kinski does a great, and sometimes an eerie/mesmerizing performance here, and his far more soft-spoken to almost whispering approach adds to the creepy/weird factor, a stark contrast from his megaphone-loudmouth that we’re mostly used to. Much of the horror relies on the psychological aspects where our man, Gunther, only leaves the victims as morbid corpses after killing them off-screen, except for two, if I remember correctly. It’s also obvious that David Schmoeller used all his writing juice on Karl Gunther, where the moldy leftover dialogue went to the rest of the cast, who have as much personality as rubber sex dolls. And the final girl isn’t much to root for, to be honest. The only woman here who actually does a convincing job is the mute one in the cage who emotes with her scared and traumatic eyes.

At the end of the day, Crawlspace works maybe more as a curiosity for the die-hard Klaus Kinski fans, and he’s the sole reason to give the film a watch, like most of the Kinski films. Or just to quote the director himself: Crawlspace is not a particularly good movie, except for the fact that it has Klaus Kinski in it.

Writer and director: David Schmoeller
Country & year: USA/Italia, 1986
Actors: Klaus Kinski, Talia Balsam, Barbara Whinnery, Carole Francis, Tane McClure, Sally Brown, Jack Heller, Abbott Alexander, Kenneth Robert Shippy
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090881/