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Murder! Mystery! and the Italian bra-shortage of 1981

May 1, 2013 Hud One comment

FEAR

1981/97m

A.k.a. Murder Obsession (DVD); Murder Syndrome; The Wailing (UK video)

Director/Writer: Riccardo Freda / Writers: Antonio Cesare Corti, Simon Mizrahi & Fabio Piccioni / Cast: Stefano Patrizi, Anita Strindberg, Silivia Dionisio, John Richardson, Henri Garcia, Martine Brochard, Laura Gemser.

Body Count: 6

Laughter Lines: “After you were sent away [SPOILER] developed an interest in black magic. It was by this means, coupled with my psychic power, that [SPOILER] was able to induce you to [SPOILER SPOILER].”

The clock strikes giallo in this colorful black-glove mystery from gothic horror fixture Riccardo Freda, sometime mentor of Mario Bava.

Going under the usual phone-directory of alternate titles around the globe, Fear is an unusual and amusing slice of Italian cheese, in which actor Michael (Patrizi) visits his mother at her secluded country home with some industry friends in tow for a weekend “away from the smog” et cetera.

Much Psycho-ness abounds as the neo-incestual relationship between mother and son is apparent and Michael quite candidly tells his friends that he killed his father years before. He also begins ignoring Agnetha-esque girlfriend Debora, who has the longest dream sequence EVER, involving a spider with fingers.

About the only time her boobs stayed put

Then soon after, the usual black-gloved loon starts doing away with the outsiders; gutting one, chainsawing another, axing a third.

Who is it? And why are the doing it? And who is it? Fear sort of collapses like a souffle as it pounds towards the bizarre ending, all black magic, cursed symbols, psychic abilities n’ such, but there’s a solid slasher movie opus lurking below the surface, and a killer with a rather standard motive.

Full of trademark zooms to suspicious expressions, a score that sounds like the composer had a seizure at the piano, bats on strings, boobs falling out of clothes at the slightest movement, and more than a few unintentional laughs from the dubbing and some of the cheapo effects on display, not least the axe in the head for one fellow. Did you know that when chopped in the noggin, the eyes actually disappear inside the skull!?

I mock, but I actually enjoyed Fear. It’s stacked with all manner of 70s/80s European fodder and Freda actually mixes the (then) new slasher craze with his gothic leanings quite well: Debora runs through the woods in a vicious downpour as lightning encroaches, and the house has a stone castle-like ambience, power that won’t stay on for long, and shitloads of candles everywhere.

Far and away the most intriguing thing about the film though, is Oliver. Oliver is mother’s butler/handyman/whatever. He takes in luggage, prepares supper, strikes a Five Star pose when about to be photographed and is the subject of nearly all of the zoom-red-herring moments. He appears at windows, stops for smell-the-fart moments when scrubbing the floor, walks in trances through the woods… What is he hiding? I’m not telling, but for now, behold the many stares of Oliver…

Despite all this super-fun, Fear seems largely unknown. A few websites I would bet on finding information about it came up blank and it’s almost as if it lay forgotten at the bottom of some VHS well throughout the 90s and 00s until it was dug up and bunged on DVD.

While not a must for fans, this is a whole lot better than a lot of Euro horror from the early 80s, with a little less sleaze to proceedings (despite the full frontal nudity and recurring “wardrobe malfunction” gag) and directed with substantial competence and flair by a bloke who was already in his 70s.

Blurbs-of-interest: Both Richardson and Brochard were in 1975’s Eyeball; Richardson was also in Torso.

Reviews

President’s Day

April 27, 2013 Hud 3 comments

HORROR HOUSE ON HIGHWAY FIVE

1985/88m

“They were young and in love. He was crazy. She was dead.”

Director/Writer: Richard Casey / Cast: Phil Therrien, Gina Christiansen, Max Manthey, Irene F, Michael Castagnolia, Ronald Reagan.

Body Count: 8

Laughter Lines: “I think I know a secluded place where you can complete your project.”

1985 was a sucky year in horror from the casual observer’s perspective: Elm Street 2 (I like it!)… Friday the 13th Part V (I like it!)… But all those people who bitch about Friday 5 should be forced to sit and watch Highway 5.

As a viewing experience, it seldom gets any weirder than Horror House on Highway Five – which was actually shot in 1983 – that trying to explain what fragments of a story there is could prove entirely redundant, but here goes…

A man and a woman in a house are murdered by a loon wearing a Richard Nixon mask. This takes approximately forever. But the woman makes some amazing faces in the mirror before she bites it.

A teacher assigns three students a project about the V2 rocket. Louise and Mike will go and make a model rocket, Sally will “do interviews”.
Sally is kidnapped by the bizarre duo of Dr Marbuse and his dim-witted assistant/friend Gary.
Mike and Louise find a dead cat and a dead body but don’t seem to care much.
A couple in a car run over the Richard Nixon loon; the guy dies in the accident, the chick runs off and finds the house where Sally is being held and is snatched away by Dr Marbuse.
Mike then goes to the same house and is slashed to death by a seemingly invisible force. The killer then goes after Louise, who also ends up back at the house, tries and fails to save Sally, is chased by Marbuse, the Richard Nixon loon, fires the rocket, and makes it to the freeway in daylight.

What the intentions of Horror House are remain a mystery. It’s got some Plan 49-style crap appeal in parts, but the 88 minutes feel more like 188, it’s difficult to tell what’s happening on screen and whomever was tasked with providing the cello music for ‘tense’ moments might’ve bothered to learn some notes first. Is it a joke? It it serious? Shot at the height of the American irony crisis of the mid-80s, it’s hard to call.

As an LSD experiment, it could prove to make for interesting watching but barely ticks any slasher movie boxes anyway. You’ll certainly be left with a lot of questions. But rather than regurgitate what those might be, here’s some additional Laughter Lines, neither of which can do justice to how bad they are delivered:

“Sure is nice out here. Not many houses though. Oh, look there’s a house. And there’s another house.”
“What’s wrong with you? You just ran that guy over. You must have a low IQ.”

Wardrobe choices are vile, with Louise (above) spending most the film in white dungarees. That hat sadly landed on her head only for this scene and then flew away for good. For a “teenager”, Mike has a big receding hairline. On occasion, there’s absolutely no dialogue or screaming where there perhaps should be.

Completists and fans of psychotronic, drug-fucked mind-trips are probably the only recommended audiences. Everyone else – scratch that – EVERYONE should stay clear.

Reviews

Sex and the city. And murder. And more sex.

April 23, 2013 Hud 4 comments

COLOR OF NIGHT

1994/18/135m

“Five suspects. Two lovers. One killer. Nothing is what it seems… except murder.”

Director: Richard Rush / Writers: Billy Ray & Matthew Chapman / Cast: Bruce Willis, Jane March, Ruben Blades, Lesley Ann Warren, Scott Bakula, Brad Dourif, Lance Henriksen, Kevin J. O’Connor, Shirley Knight, Andrew Lowery, Kathleen Wilhoite, Eriq La Selle.

Body Count: 4

If the slasher film was a real 80s thing, then the 90s surely belonged to the erotic thriller. The first half of the decade was churning out skin-centric Hitchcock-wannabes like the Sugababes go through members. Basic Instinct, Sliver, Body of Evidence, Boxing Helena… Murder and mating was where it was at.

Despite big budgets and star power not to be sniffed at, this subset was just as trashy as any low-rent slasher movie from ten years before, upping the skin and dropping the grue. Possibly top of the tree in terms of trash appeal is also the closest in relation to its slasher flick origins: Witness the utter stupidity that is Color of Night.

Bruce Willis is New York shrink Bill Capa, who witnesses angry patient Wilhoite toss herself out of his skyscraper office window. The trauma of the incident renders him unable to see any shades of red.

A few weeks later, he relocates to Los Angeles to catch up with an old shrink-pal (Bakula) and sits in on his Monday night therapy group, populated by a quintet of folks with an assortment of problems ranging from nymphomania to barely suppressed rage and gender identity issues. It’s plainly obvious the killer is one of the group. It’s plainly obvious which one it’ll turn out to be also.

When shrink-pal is knifed to death in his office, Brucie sticks around to pick up the pieces after being nominated by a loudmouth cop to break the news to the therapy group. This all runs parallel to his aggressively sexual relations with cutesy tease Rose (March), whose mysterious comings and goings become suspicious.

High-octane stunts weren’t popular in the slasher sub-genre, so Color of Night provides an interesting diversion from the usual who-dies-next composite, but the intermittent soft-core sexual escapades of the leads (that show Brucie naked from all angles) pad the film out past a grinding two hours, with a rushed conclusion that’d be good were the identity of the killer not so luminously flagged in front of our eyes.

A moment which would make a great Ridiculous Scene O’ the Month features Brucie, walking along the street, is being stalked by a red car (so he can’t see it) that drives along the top of a building, where it would be 100% impossible to see somebody on the street below sans periscope, and then manages to calculate the precise moment it should shunt another car over the edge to land on him.

Crap, a box office flop ($19m against a budget of more than twice that), but look at that cast roster: Bakula, Warren, Knight, Dourif, Henriksen. The latter two are largely wasted in their red herring roles, but as a curiosity beyond the usual Jason-kills-teens template, Color of Night is a trashbag dipped in cheese affair: it’s ludicrous but kinda tasty.

Blurbs-of-interest: Dourif was the voice of Chucky throughout the Child’s Play series and was also in Chain Letter, Trauma, Urban Legend, Dead Scared, and both of Rob Zombie’s Halloween re-do’s; Henriksen was in The Horror Show, Madhouse (2003), and Scream 3; Kathleen Wilhoite played the quirky psychic in Witchboard.

Reviews

Title Recall: Simple and Effective

April 19, 2013 Hud 3 comments

Pardon the pun, but the title tells it all for this round. These are my favourite title cards – not necessarily those that belong to my favourite movies, but they just tick ‘that’ box, y’know?

Underwhelming though it may be, the colonial-like fontage of All the Boys… makes for prettiness, before it’s then splattered with BLOOOOOOOD, a bit of which seductively drips from the ‘Y’ in the titular character’s name.

Here we are again with cutesy lettering design, like that beautiful calligraphy we all wish we were capable of. [Review here].

I’m weirdly entranced by the swirly hypnotic end-of-film credits sequence of Darkness Falls. I actively dislike this whole credits-at-the-end thing, but the sexy graphics, coupled with the awesome Vixtrola song ‘Gunboat’, make me think it was intended for use at the opening and then shoved to the back because some exec thought the pacing wasn’t tight enough.

Simple n’ striking, just like the film itself.

Much-laughed-at sequel, largely disowned even by Wes Craven, but I like this title card, it’s rough n’ rustic looking, completely at odds with the comedic marathon that follows: blind and psychic final girl, dog capable of flashbacks, Sherry Palmer from ’24’… It rocks. [Review]

It’s all about the misaligned text, oooh chaotic right? Nah… not very, Last Summer is so straight it could march with one of those wackadoo churches at an anti-everything parade.

…And speaking of churches, more nice fonty action, but it doesn’t really go with the whole Prom Night ‘brand’ if you will. [Review].

Dig those shoes. Bet they were comfy. Another rubbish film with a nice and neat title card. Very 80s when you think about it, ‘specially those white socks with jeans. [Review]

And lastly, a film that’s as simple and effective (though not massively) as it’s postcard title card. Dull font, but the locale is all picturesque and purty – just the place you’d expect a psychotic loon to show up dressed as The Tooth Fairy. I can’t actually remember who the killer was or if they were a supernatural entity or not.

So there we go, some nice title cards. Bye.

Lists

Get well soon

April 15, 2013 Hud 4 comments

VISITING HOURS

1982/99m

“The hospital where your next visit… will be your last.”

Director: Jean Claude Lord / Writer: Brian Taggert / Cast: Lee Grant, Michael Ironside, William Shatner, Linda Purl, Lenore Zann, Harvey Atkin, Helen Hughes.

Body Count: 5

First off, Jean Claude Lord is a bad ass name. For anyone.

Shame that’s where the bad assery of Visiting Hours comes to a halt with as much high octane action as a narrowboat derby on the Norfolk Broads.

And it is a shame because this rather plush Canadian production starts off so well, with Lee Grant’s rather confident reporter setting a couple of chauvinists right live on the telly, which angers all round unpleasant viewer Colt Hawker (Ironside), who then decides to kill her.

A tense scene in which Lee returns home to find everything a bit off culminates beautifully with butt-naked Hawker bursting out wearing nothing but some of her clip-on jewellery and slashing at her. She escapes with the aid of the ever-handy dumb-waiter and is admitted to the county hospital.

Dissatisfied with his failure, Hawker spends the next 80 minutes trying to gain access to her hospital room to finish the job. Why he didn’t just hop downstairs and kill her before is unclear. Visiting Hours skips from genre-to-genre like a frog with ADHD, never sticking with being a slasher film, or an anchorwoman-in-peril thriller, or boring hospital soap. At times it manages to straddle all three at once. Make no mistake, this is no Halloween II. Or Hospital Massacre.

What few victims there are are misidentified patients and luckless schmucks who are in the wrong place at the wrong time; he cuts a respirator for an old lady and creepily photographs her dying, then knifes the nurse who comes to help out. But most the time it’s Lee Grant being paranoid, Linda Purl’s sweet but jittery nurse being sweet and jittery, or Ironside living his rather sad life.

Visiting Hours does draw the viewer more into the ‘story’ of the killer. Rather than a masked loon running amok for reasons yet to be revealed, Colt Hawker is quickly identified as some angered-up sexual miscreant who detests strong women, wears a leather vest, and flashes back to his over-touchy-feely dad playing around with him. Is this insightful or inciteful? Arguably, the audience doesn’t want to feel sorrow for the killer, especially when his primary hobby is cutting up women – a topical issue concerning the genre during this era – however, the film could just be digging deeper.

For it’s pointless inclusion on the Video Nasties list – I’ve watched both versions some years apart and can’t tell the difference – Visiting Hours is a rather tame affair, buoyed by big-name actors, there’s little exploitation on show. Ironside’s threat is far more psychological than visceral. However, the straying from the tried and tested slasher formula is what does the most harm: Visiting Hours is boring.

Final Girl said of it that she was surprised it didn’t clock in at five hours, which, considering there’s more padding on show than you’d find at auditions for TOWIE, is totally valid. For my repeat viewing, I had to watch in shifts so my eyes would remain open. After the initial assault, it’d be more interesting to go and sit in a hospital waiting room for two hours than watch this again.

Bizarrely, despite Ironside’s solid depiction of Colt Hawker’s sad-ass psycho, he’s a pretty incapable killer. His main quarry escapes the first time, he botches killing somebody else, leaves a teen babysitter to survive, and again fails to execute his plan on several more occasions. He did better in American Nightmare, which also featured Lenore Zann as a ‘lady of the night.’

Plus points for performances and casting a woman in her mid-50s as the final ‘girl’, everything looks slick, but balance is lost in the expense-to-boredom ratio. But I always enjoy a film where there are genre regulars, and because Canada only had 23 actors in the early 80s, most of them are in this too. If only they’d had more conviction in what they were creating – either the horror, thriller, or soap – it might’ve been a place worth visiting.

And why is there a dog seemingly employed by the hospital living in the basement?

Blurbs-of-interest: Ironside was also in Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II, Children of the Corn: Revelation, Fallen Angels and Reeker; The Shatner was a criminology pro (ha!) in American Psycho II (ha!); Lenore Zann was one of the Crawford Top Ten of Happy Birthday to Me and can also be seen in American Nightmare and PrettyKill; Harvey Atkin was in Funeral Home.

Reviews

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