Forward to the Past

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In a sort of pre-emptive celebration of the release of Scream 4, March 15th to April 15th 2011 is 90s Horror Month on Vegan Voorhees.

This means that the next few weeks will be solely devoted to the love of Ghostface, The Fisherman, uh… Parka-killer-fiend and all manner of imitations, resurrections, sequels, wannabes and cash-ins. Yes, some have been reviewed already but there’ll be “new” and “exciting” things to say that weren’t said before. Or were and have been deleted by me in an effort to disguise the fact.

We’ll also be cheerleading the various little things that 90s teen horror gave us, from killers with super-personal motives to the total lack of boobs on screen and so-called homages that were little more than blatant rip-offs of films the producers thought nobody had seen.

For the pedants among you, “the 90s” will also include films released in 2000, as they were most likely conceived and shot while the 90s were still about.

So, prepare to get self-referential and in-jokey; 90s Horror Month begins at the chime.

…Chime!

Big trees don’t cry

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THE CRYING TREE

2 Stars  2003/18/86m

A.k.a. Jun-Ka-Por (Thai)

“A homicidal maniac or vengeful spirit?”

Director: Worachet Nimsuwan / Writer: Sonchati / Cast: Pinpin Chanta, Chalad Na Songkla, Preeyanuch Panpradui, Goldie Stanley, Sapanut Chatwibon, Pittaya Na Ranong.

Body Count: 7

Dire-logue: “I reckon it’s the work of some psychopath.”

A ferociously cheesy Thai export with skewered echoes of Friday the 13th.

Sweet natured Pilai is the benefactor and manager of a quiet countryside resort and lives there with her mother, uncle, aunt and some cousins. Nearly all the men in her life are desperately in love with her and will seemingly go to any lengths to win her affection…even kill off the competition.

For every would-be suitor who comes into Pilai’s life – including tour operators, investors, and cops – is soon stalked, slain and relieved of their heart by a cloaked and masked figure who sings the titular song.

The killer’s identity is so blindingly obvious that the script hardly takes any steps to disguise it! But for your benefit, could it be hunky delegate Inthon? Her ill-tempered cuz Suwan? Or someone closer to home? Hint: it’s someone closer to home.

Although cheap and essentially lacklustre, there’s a so-bad-it’s-funny appeal in the discount store production values and zooming close-ups on suspicious facial tics; the score is overblown and really belongs to a high-end disaster movie. The end is a complete rip-off of The Good Son‘s unlikely climactic act, although not nearly as painstakingly overwrought.

With an unexpected twist glued on at the end, The Crying Tree manages to entertain once, but the prospect of returning to this particular resort brings with it the threat of vomit.

Super-hilarious scenes to look out for: a victim-to-be dumb enough to accept a ride in a truck driven by a masked and cloaked figure and the cop who beats Inthon with a copy of the Yellow Pages!

Trade-a-Life III

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Here we go again, playing God with the lives of hopeless slasher movie characters… As ever, contribute, criticise, shout n’ scream. Hell, it’s not like we can change any of it now…

Watch out for those ma-hoosive spoilers!

THE HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW

A double Trade to start off this time. The sorority girlies of the house on, y’know, the row (…assumedly of other sorority houses), were most definitely guilty of killing their acid-tongued housemother in a prank gone wrong and as such, they probably deserved what they got. Well, the ones who were in on the joke, for sure. Requisite nice girl Kate is the only one with a wise head on her shoulders but I was quite sad to see overgrown-child Morgan (Jodi Draigie) and ribbon-haired Jeanie (Robin Meloy) go out violently.

I’d have much preferred to see leading-bitch Vicki’s greasy man-toy (who supplied the very gun that was used in the gag-gone-bad) turn up willy-nilly and getting that creepy-ass walking stick through his head… Or there’s Kate’s dorky date-for-the-night Peter (Michael Kuhn), who is pretty much innocent in it all but could’ve been meanly killed off to add fire to Kate’s strikeback. He didn’t do much else that was interesting. May as well’ve died!

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VI: JASON LIVES

This is a bit of a popular one as I’ve read a few times that people were sad to see Camp Forest Green counsellor Paula (Kerry Noonan) exit proceedings so brutally. Even the filmmakers seemed to think enough of her to give her an off-camera death (sort of). We see Jason burst into the room and the camera cuts to the exterior where a blood splash redecorates the window before Paula’s corpse is smashed through the glass. Yeah…still kinda mean for the nice girl whose only concern was the little kiddies.

Now, this was recently altered from a swap with surviving gal Megan (Jennifer Cooke) but it was pointed out that the kids at camp were far, far more deserving of Jason’s chop so it has come to pass that having failed to find a good group shot of all the kids at camp, I nominate about the only ones who get any lines of dialogue (bar the little girl who has a nightmare): Ty and Billy (played by brothers Justin and Tommy Nowell, one of whom later appeared in Sleepaway Camp II). They’re sarcastic and whingey for their cumulative two or three minutes on screen so they should die instead of Paula. Jason’s been far too liberal when it comes to kids in the past, he should’ve made an example of these two.

URBAN LEGENDS: FINAL CUT

Urban Legends 2 is a strange little slasher flick but a pretty good one all the same: student/final girl Amy (Jennifer Morrison) finds her friends/crew being stalked n’ slashed one by one by a fencing-masked loon with some ridiculous motive up his sleeve (and it is really ridiculous). Strangely, not only she and her obligatory love interest are left at the end. Reese (Loretta Devine) is there, natch, but bizarrely two other random guys are left unscathed… Weird.

They’re red herrings, of course, but even once the killer is revealed they could’ve been done away with. Especially sleaze-merchant rich-boy Graham (Joey Joseph Lawrence), who hangs around on his phone to his producer daddy all day and commits the unforgivable sin of suggesting Amy should insert CGI gore into her film rather than old fashioned latex grue!

So, give him the chop and let’s save import-a-camera-guy Schorm ‘Simon’ Jabuscko (Marco Hofschneider), who turns up to help the gang out, makes their film look all nice and does it all with a sexy European accent – and is then gruesomely beaten to death with a lens.

And they let Blossom’s little brother live!?

Guttenberg Lives!

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CORNERED!

3 Stars  2009/18/83m

“The face of evil.”

Director: Daniel Maze / Writers: Maze & Darrin Grimwood / Cast: Steve Guttenberg, James Duval, Elizabeth Nicole, Peter Story, Eduardo Antonio Garcia, Ellia English.

Body Count: 6

Dire-logue: “Are we playing cards or sucking dick here?”

A zipper-faced slasher is hacking up convenience / liquor store patrons in LA. There’s a $500,000 reward on his head that a group of employees at a dead end store discuss at the end of their day, including how they’d choose to do away with the psycho if they ever crossed paths with him.

There’s Steve the a-hole boss, his cold-turkey suffering nephew, Jimmy, donut-obsessed Donny, supersized phone-sex operator Mona and local hooker Jess. Steve Guttenberg is Morty, the delivery guy.

An altercation with a local hobo breaks the front door, which is quickly boarded up, thus locking the group in for their late night poker game and soon locking the killer in with them…

In true generic style, each person finds a reason to go downstairs into the store and gets murdered in the same way that they suggested they’d do away with the loon. Ironic. The killer must’ve been listening into their conversation…!

Cornered! has pleasant echoes of 1988’s Intruder, though the run-down store is a lot smaller than Walnut Lane Supermarket and has fewer weapons for the killer to pick from, though he does do away with one schmuch with a pair of Cornettos! It’s as predictable as they come but putting a little effort into the photography and characters makes the world of difference between this and, say, Somebody Help Me, where I just wanted the cast to die quickly and neatly.

Going against it, the identity of the killer is evident from the off but it allows for lines almost as corny as those in Intruder: “Clean up in aisle 3!” There’s also a thick wad of conveniences (well, it is a convenience store) and dumb reasons for people to split. When one guy finds a lengthy blood trail where the previous victim’s corpse has been dragged away, he calls out: “I see you shithead… I followed your trail of ketchup!”

A nice one-off with the is-it/isn’t-it appeal of seeing Guttenberg back on screen, you could do a lot worse than this. And I have.

Blurb-of-interest: James Duval was in The Clown at Midnight and May.

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