SECRET SATAN 2022

[Curt McGirt]

The Dawn remake wasn't too bad. I caught a good chunk of it on TV last month. It might have the only John Leguizamo role I like besides Spider Mike in Spun. (BTW, he's gonna be in that new horror movie with Ralph Fiennes, The Meal or whatever it's called. The one that's yet another ripoff of The Most Dangerous Game.)

I'm surprised this stuff didn't come out last month. That and the AI doll movie and the cannibal Young Adult movie were all trailers at Terrifier 2 and we saw that the day before Halloween. 

14 hours ago, Travis Sheldon said:

Was it the Day of the Dead (2008) remake that had a zombie crawling on the ceiling? Good times.

Ooof. You'd have to pay me to watch that. 

[J.T.]

2 minutes ago, Curt McGirt said:

 Ralph Fiennes, The Meal or whatever it's called. The one that's yet another ripoff of The Most Dangerous Game.)

Yeah, looking forward to seeing what The Menu is really all about.

[Curt McGirt]

It looks like a bunch of rich assholes getting slaughtered by hostile chefs which would definitely be a Tony Bourdain approved plotline, but there's definitely something more going on. 

Also you gotta think that Ralph Fiennes being attached is pretty high-brow for a horror flick, so...

Edited November 11, 2022 by Curt McGirt

[Execproducer]

3 hours ago, RIPPA said:

I plan on running this again this year with a few tweaks as I think I figured out a way to do it where everyone can select movies but you can also get some sort of bad luck protection

Just speaking for myself, "bad luck protection" would take some of the fun out of the whole deal. I didn't enjoy my film this year but certainly several other people who participated would have. I definitely don't mind being exposed to something new and deciding for myself if it works for me.

But if it helps keep the flame alive ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[RIPPA]

Oh it's not full on "bad luck protection" if you will.

It is more a way for me to merge what we have done in the past with ideas to freshen the format up

[(BP)]

I sent you a movie @RIPPA but it’s a real stinker and I’m not sure if So Bad It’s Good is your kind of thing, so I’m kind of relieved you didn’t end up watching it. 

[RIPPA]

Dammit - I knew there was something I needed to do

I will do it this weekend

And I will gladly still accept any additional bonus reviews - surely someone could review Smile or something.

[Execproducer]

If Monday is okay, I’ll have one or two ready.

[RIPPA]

7 hours ago, Execproducer said:

If Monday is okay, I’ll have one or two ready.

Fine with me - I ain’t going anywhere 

[RIPPA]

BONUS REVIEW: THE INVISIBLE MAN (Whale, 1933)

IMDB

ROTTEN TOMATOES

REVIEWED BY @Curt McGirt

This has been a bad blindspot with me in my Universal horror viewing for years. I finally got around to Creature from the Black Lagoon last year so this year it's Invisible Man; maybe next year I'll watch Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein or something. I recorded it before but since it was on TCM again it was irresistible. 

Claude Rains, a highly respected stage actor and theatrical teacher who had only had one film role prior, was chosen to carry this based on his voice, and it sure as hell is a good one. We open at your typical rowdy Bavarian-style inn/public house that's packed with local townspeople yucking it up, until the door opens to a wintry stranger wrapped in bandages with only his nose sticking out. They immediately get up to gossiping if he's an escaped prisoner or something while he takes a room upstairs. He calls away for a bunch of scientific gear and keeps throwing fits until the owner and his shrill, comedy-relief wife decide to throw him out, at which point he goes ahead and shows them the Full Monty. It's a brilliant move. You'd expect the reveal to come in the middle to end but it's at the very start and hooks whoever's watching because in 2022 it still looks incredible, in 1933 it must have had people fainting or running from the theater. Griffin, our villain, busts up the inn and escapes back to his former employer, assistant, and girlfriend's home, explaining himself to the assistant. He's a poor chemist who's discovered and taken this secret elixir that gives him invisibility but also homicidal madness. The latter of which he indulges in by killing a cop first thing out, then dumping a guy off a cliff and DERAILING A FREIGHT TRAIN which is just a totally evil thing for anyone to do in any movie. I'm surprised he didn't kick a dog to death or something. Anyway, he gets double-crossed by his friend and the cops eventually trap him. 

As with the other early Universals this one is a remarkably tight picture, short and lean and in this case especially, mean. Rains hasn't a question of sympathy in him until the very end. Unlike Dr. Jekyll we get no back-and-forth between normal and not normal, he's just batshit the whole time, ranting about the power to create invisible armies and kill and rape at will. Not only are the demasking/undressing/redressing effects remarkable but so are the fun little things like floating books and flying beer mugs and him absconding with a drawer full of money at a bank. The bicycle riding by itself is especially tickling. The other actors are just pretty much there in this, your typical stupid townspeople and blowhard police. Gloria Stewart is pretty in that '30s blonde waif with a nice perm way. But this is Rains' movie, and even though we only see his visage at the very end of the film, that mocking, angry voice is just perfect the whole way through. 

You know what, I haven't seen the new Invisible Man yet either (and have it on the DVR)... or all of Hollow Man with Kevin Bacon which had a pretty freaky ending as I recall. Need to remember those two for later. 

[RIPPA]

NIGHT KILLER (Claudio Fragasso, 1990)

IMDB

ROTTEN TOMATOES

 

SELECTED BY @(BP)

I wanted to pick something on Tubi since a lot of the horror I’ve watched this year has been on Shudder or other paid services. This was directed by the auteur responsible for Troll 2 and despite being called Nightkiller has only daytime kills, so you can imagine what you’re getting into. (And then after I forgot I had to review it) “it’s a real stinker and I’m not sure if So Bad It’s Good is your kind of thing, so I’m kind of relieved you didn’t end up watching it.”
 

REVIEWED BY RIPPA
In a previous Halloween Havoc, I did a bonus review for the documentary “Best Worst Movie’. Just in case you are unaware, that documentary is about Troll 2 which has developed a cult following for being the king of “so bad it’s good”. One line from that review is:

The middle of the documentary features the Italian Director and Crew trying to convince us that the movie is actually good and misunderstood.

That “Italian Director” is Claudio Fragasso… director of Night Killer. Though he went by the name Clyde Anderson and he was known as Drake Floyd for Troll 2. That is just the very very very tip of the madness mountain we are gonna unravel here. (IMDB says Night Killer is the movie he did right before Troll 2 but as you will see when I get to the production horse shit might not be the case).

This movie is such a bat shit fever dream that I feel like I need to talk about every last part and spoil the shit of out it. But this movie is such a bat shit fever dream, I almost feel like you should watch it first (especially if you know nothing about it.). I am gonna split this into two parts – all the movie related stuff will be in the spoiler box just to give folks the option of avoiding if you so choose

There are A LOT of triggers in this movie that folks could find upsetting.
•    Rape
•    Suicide
•    Memory Loss
•    Psychological abuse
•    Manipulation
•    Police incompetence
•    Medial Malpractice
•    Mental Health Professional Abuse (I don’t know how else to say this other than, if this is your therapist, find a new therapist and file every single possible complaint ever against the old one)

I don’t want to do a blanket “Oh everyone here watches Horror – DESENSITIZED TO EVERYTHING~!” I can’t assume that – despite the “waves arms” whatever this was – folks won’t take some of the issues seriously. Anyway, that should be the last warning from Papa Rippa

Spoiler

A nise Freddy Krueger with rubber nails on his hands is running around raping and killing people. (He is legit wearing a Freddy Krueger mask just sans hat. It was like they decided no one watching the movie would make the connection.) The movie opens with Nise Freddy (this is what I am calling him the rest of the way) killing a dancer and the director of this dance troupe – complete with the director doing a Peter Pan off the balcony to the floor in front of the Dance Troupe. Mind you – literally none of the other dancers could give two shits this happened and you quickly see how piss pour the special effects are gonna be. Fine. You are thinking “Okay this is just gonna be a terrible slasher.” Nothing ground breaking here.

We then are transported to the stars of the movie – Tara Buckman and Tara Buckman’s breasts. Most horror fans will know Buckman from Silent Night, Deadly Night. I, however, know Buckman and her breasts from Cannonball Run where she and Adrienne Barbeau driving a Lamborghini awoken a whole lotta things inside myself. Hmm… maybe it is a good thing this part is in spoilers.

Buckman is playing Melanie. They are home in Virginia… Virginia Beach to be specific. @J.T. is gonna have a lot of issues with this “Virginia Beach”. Anyway – her daughter is going away for the weekend and that leaves time for Melanie to play with her breasts. Oh, and Nise Freddy shows up. Dammit! That was the important part. Anyway – the screen goes black. Melanie wakes up in the hospital with amnesia. The only thing she remembers is that her best friend Sherman saved her and, in the process, Sherman got this huge scar across his face. Meanwhile, Melanie’s doctor tells the police that she can’t talk about it because thinking too hard about it might make her really lose her memory. Umm… okay??? But then the doctor is all “Hey! Go live at home, by yourself, again! That will totally jog your memory!” Umm… how about no.

This is when the other key component of the movie shows up – Axel. Axel is Melanie’s husband, however they are separated. (Wait? Where they separated? Maybe they were divorced. Fuck, my memory sucks.) Either fucking way Axel is a douchenoggle of the highest degree. Oh and Melanie doesn’t remember that she had a relationship with Axel. Axel also sweats… a lot. 

At one point, Axel follows Melanie to a gym and then into the bathroom. Melanie tricks him though, pulls out a gun and forces to strip and flush he clothes down the toilet. Axel is then wearing a blue speedo in a scene that was clearly designed to show he had a huge dick I guess.

Axel starts abusing the fuck out of Melanie – including sticking a gun in her mouth – telling her to snap out of it and she needs to get over herself. So yes, Axel instantly becomes one of those “Excuse me – Mr. Killer. I would like to make a request.” Like all the fuckers in Blair Witch

Melanie is so traumatized by this she tries to commit suicide by ingesting pills and drowning herself. Axel “saves” her but it is “save” in the loosest sense of the word as he beats the shit out of her some more while doing so and keeps shoving her head back under the water. (I believe the idea here was he was trying to throw up the pills but I am not willing to give Axel that much credit for quick thinking.) Melanie gets away and goes to the cops. So the cops think Axel is now Nise Freddy.

Meanwhile, Nise Freddy is making kills – none of them during the actual night. I mean I guess technically it is night somewhere in the world.

BTW, Nise Freddy shows up AGAIN at Melanie’s house again but doesn’t kill her. So Sherman declares he is gonna to catch the Axel because everything thinks he is a horrible freak now due to the scar. Axel is now on the run from the cops and Sherman. So that means it is basically time for the climax and for everything to go “yeah whatever to WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?!?!” in under 5 seconds.

Nise Freddy shows up for a THIRD time at Melanie’s house. Here is where, because we are all wrestling fans and have watched Scooby Doo, the least shocking swerve ever happens. Melanie rips the mask off of Nise Freddy and, of course, the killer is revealed to be Sherman. Melanie gets her memory back and we flashback to see that Sherman had attacked Melanie and tied her up. He is declaring his love for her (I am guessing she had to have explained to him she wasn’t interested at some point. I am a little fuzzy here. I admit I might be trying to force a narrative into a movie that might have been going for "well of course she should have fucked him!"). The usual – if he can’t have her, no one will. But for reasons clear to only God and Vince Russo – he decides that instead, he will untie her, give her a knife so she can kill herself. As we now know – Melanie slashes his face and runs away. (The trauma of the event caused the amnesia.)

Back to the present – Sherman is still all “Love Me or You Will Die”. So Melanie seduces him and then stabs him in the dick. Obviously, if anyone deserved to be stabbed in the dick, it was Sherman. Axel then bursts in – literally bursts in like he is the fucking Resident Evil dog – and shoots Sherman dead.

"But Rippa!" I imagine you saying – nothing you are saying is remotely surprising…. Especially in horror and you are correct. But, however, how many other movies do you then find out that Axel was acting like an abusive asshole because the doctor told him too. Apparently, the quack’s brilliant plan was to beat the memory back into her. And the cops were in on it!

But wait – there is more! Then it is Christmas time. Melanie and Axel start fucking because they are back together (honestly – this might be the thing I have the most issues with in the movie.). So they are fucking. While they are fucking – you are seeing shots randomly of their daughter going down to the Christmas Tree, pulling out a present, opening it to reveal… a Nise Freddy’s mask that she then puts on and starts talking like Nise Freddy?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

There are ways to tease a sequel you are never getting and then there is THIS way to tease a sequel you are never getting.

Everything in that spoiler box is what I could remember from the one time I watched and what I could decipher from my shitty handwriting. I haven't had to do this is a long time. It was like memories of trying to review an unlabelled early days of Osaka Pro show.

If you have watched this – you know that none of the actual killings have anything to do with the actual plot of the movie. This is because Fragasso wanted to make a psychological thriller and when the studio saw his version, they were all “Fuck That!”. They then brought in Fragasso’s boy Bruno Mattei to add all the gore and killing. (Apparently, they were no longer boys after Mattei since clearly Fragasso was pissed off. Now I don't blame him but Fragasso is also clearly half a bubble off plumb.) This is why it seems like you are watching two movies shot on the same roll of film.

It also could be that they needed all the gore and killings because they were Italian and decided to release the film in Italy as a sequel to Texas Chainsaw Massacre. NO ONE got that memo. I mean if you are going do that at least run a chainsaw in the background or something.

It is really hard for me to go with the “So Bad It’s Good” vibe that apparently this movie as attracted on the internet. (I found so many fucking podcasts about this fucking movie.) To me – Troll 2 is a much better example. At least that had people who had no business acting. Most of the folks didn’t take it too seriously and the you just had some alien vegans trying to turn people into vegetables. Here Fragasso – still crazy – was trying to make his thriller but went way too over the top. It was like he watched Fatal Attraction and was like “there aren’t enough disturbing themes”.

God – this really ruined Tara Buckman’s breasts for me.

[Curt McGirt]

It's not a Freddy mask but it is a really bad, cheap Halloween mask that they got at the supermarket. Maybe a Goodwill, haha. 

I forgot two things about Invisible Man. 1. This movie scared my dad to death as a kid. We joked about it when I was a kid. 2. I for some reason thought the villain's first name was Peter which would make him Peter Griffin and that was a hoot. Surely there's a Family Guy where they have a skit of Peter turning invisible and stealing pizzas or something. 

This had to have been done later but there's a part in the movie where Rains describes how you can't watch him after a meal until after he digests his food which is pretty gnarly to suggest to the audience, even if you couldn't film it. 

[(BP)]

I regret not including a trigger warning just in case. Outside of the goofy kills and Buckman’s breast’s it’s not a very graphic movie, but the dialogue makes it gross and distressing anyway. The incongruity between the Fragrasso parts and the reshoots is really apparent when they talk about victims being abused for hours after we just saw the killer do a Mortal Kombat punch through their chest killing them instantly. 

Here’s a pretty succinct NSFW review for anyone just looking for the laughs. 

 

Edited November 14, 2022 by (BP)

[Curt McGirt]

Has anyone watched Memoirs of an Invisible Man? I think I actually have that on an old John Carpenter collection. It's probably not worth watching a Chevy Chase movie but my ears are up. 

[odessasteps]

6 minutes ago, Curt McGirt said:

Has anyone watched Memoirs of an Invisible Man? I think I actually have that on an old John Carpenter collection. It's probably not worth watching a Chevy Chase movie but my ears are up. 

I saw it years ago (maybe I reviewed it) but don't remember anything about it. 

[Execproducer]

And if you must watch a Chevy Chase movie, Foul Play is the way to go.

[Execproducer]

4 hours ago, RIPPA said:

NIGHT KILLER (Claudio Fragasso, 1990)

 

What I got from this review is that Cannonball Run is a deeply underappreciated film and I couldn't agree more.

[(BP)]

5 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

Has anyone watched Memoirs of an Invisible Man? I think I actually have that on an old John Carpenter collection. It's probably not worth watching a Chevy Chase movie but my ears are up. 

I loved it as a kid and the book it’s based on is pretty good. It’s been a while, but it’s probably a decent curiosity in as much as it’s the studio movie that broke John Carpenter’s spirit and began his transition to underachieving video game grampy. 

The score by Shirley Walker is fantastic though. I believe it was the first solo composing credit for a woman in the history of Hollywood, which is crazy. Chevy Chase is a famous asshole, but he uncharacteristically used his clout to get her the job despite studio pushback. She also scored Batman: The Animated series and the rest of the 90s DC animated series, and the film’s music has that energy to it. 

[odessasteps]

2 hours ago, Execproducer said:

And if you must watch a Chevy Chase movie, Foul Play is the way to go.

I wonder how badly Mofern Problems has aged as afilm.

[J.T.]

9 hours ago, odessasteps said:

I wonder how badly Mofern Problems has aged as afilm.

It has probably aged really poorly and most of the comedic bits from the movie are most certainly verboten in the modern age.

The theme track from Modern Problems aka Gonna Get It Next Time by The Tubes is a lost classic of 80's rock.

The Tubes-Gonna Get It Next Time (HQ-12" Promotional Single-From The Film "Modern Problems") - YouTube

If I absolutely had to watch a Chevy Chase movie at this very minute, it would either be Fletch, Foul Play, or National Lampoon's Vacation.  Everything else is practically garbage.  I've never been of the opinion that Chase was particularly funny or even a decent actor.

Edited November 15, 2022 by J.T.

[J.T.]

 

[Curt McGirt]

We watch Christmas Vacation like clockwork every year in my household so Chevy will always have that. I'm also probably one of the only people on Earth who loves Vegas Vacation, too. But aside from that I can't think of anything. I haven't even seen Fletch. 

[(BP)]

Nothing But Trouble is a movie I intellectually understand is bad but I find compulsively watchable. It imprinted on me as a kid when it was in constant rotation on HBO. 

[Execproducer]

9 hours ago, J.T. said:

It has probably aged really poorly and most of the comedic bits from the movie are most certainly verboten in the modern age.

The theme track from Modern Problems aka Gonna Get It Next Time by The Tubes is a lost classic of 80's rock.

The Tubes-Gonna Get It Next Time (HQ-12" Promotional Single-From The Film "Modern Problems") - YouTube

If I absolutely had to watch a Chevy Chase movie at this very minute, it would either be Fletch, Foul Play, or National Lampoon's Vacation.  Everything else is practically garbage.  I've never been of the opinion that Chase was particularly funny or even a decent actor.

I haven't seen Modern Problems since it was big. And when it was big, I musta seen it a million trillion fucking times. Yeah, it probably doesn't pass muster for this era but it's peak Dabney Coleman.

Second the love for Gonna Get It Next Time.

I'll admit to having love for Under The Rainbow but that is largely down to Carrie Fisher and Billy Barty. Barty also appeared in Foul Play.  And yes, Under The Rainbow is another one that wouldn't get past a pitch meeting today.

It occurs to me that most of the Chase stuff I like has more to do with his co-stars and generally well written stories than anything having to do with Chase himself.

However, Fletch is undeniable.

[J.T.]

1 hour ago, Curt McGirt said:

We watch Christmas Vacation like clockwork every year in my household so Chevy will always have that. I'm also probably one of the only people on Earth who loves Vegas Vacation, too. But aside from that I can't think of anything. I haven't even seen Fletch. 

Yeah, Christmas Vacation is also pretty awesome.  I think it works because Clark plays straight man to the batshit family antics instead of being a bumbling idiot most of the time. 

He also speaks for every working man alive when he says these immortal words.

Christmas Vacation - "Hallelujah...Holy SHIT!" - YouTube

Edited November 15, 2022 by J.T.