Really Dirty Beddings: Lucker The Necrophagus (1986)

Lucker The Necrophagous (Belgium, 1986)

Rating: *1/2
Starring: Nick Van Suyt, Helga Vandevelde, Let Jotts

I remember my very first Fangoria magazine; I was 13-years old and it's issue #252, with Michael Rooker's face in heavy and slimy alien mutant make-up gracing the front cover. Within those pages are DVD reviews and one of them happens to be of Lucker The Necrophagous (1986), and I recall the magazine being unfavorable about the film. I guess I should have taken that as a warning of what I'm getting myself into when I finally decided to see this grey market exploitation indie many, many years later, but the damn curious cat inside of me is egging to see just how much of a trainwreck this movie is.

And, boy, is it a trainwreck.

The story of Lucker The Necrophagous (1986) follows the titular serial-killer who likes to rape and murder women, though not necessarily on that order. The film opens with him heavily sedated in a mental institution after a suicide attempt, but his medication wears off too soon and Lucker is up killing orderlies, having his way on some of the bodies, and escaping into town to lay low. We eventually learn that it's been eight years since his reign of gross terror ended with his capture, a total of eight victims under his kill count. Should have been nine, though, and after hearing about this one gal, Cathy Jordan, surviving his rampage (and finding out where she lives through a damn phone book!), Lucker sets off to correct his mistake, taking a few lives along the way. (And, yes, the freak got his rocks off on a few of the resulting corpses)

Apparently, Lucker The Necrophagous (1986) is a film made to be purposely offensive as a way for the director, Johan Vandewoestijine, to get back at the Belgian Film Commission. The resulting production was rough, with Johan withholding the finer details of the movie from fiscal backers just to get the money to make it, only for the producer to destroy the negatives, leaving only bits and pieces of the film to work with for the final product. That would explain the choppiness of the story and the patchwork-editing quality of the movie itself, though that did little to null the extreme repulsiveness of its taboo subject matter, especially when an infamous "bed scene" was done leeringly long and filled with as much vomit-inducing gags you'd wish to could bleach away from your brain once the dirty deed is done. Past that, the story is basically a 68-minute short slasher (74 minutes for the Belgian VHS release) wherein we simply watch Lucker stab people to death with very little workable dialogue to go with, even more so by its climax when everything devolves into a cacophony of screams and grunts amidst the film's score, punctuated by a rather confusing ending. 

There's few in the way of substance here, but we do see some bit of style through the giallo-inspired candy-colored lighting and stylized photography. Gore and make-up effects are also a fair highlight, something a movie of this dirty of a plot would benefit from and did, but that's as far as the positives could go. Sad to say, Lucker The Necrophagous (1986), a button-pushing shlock made to test just how far one can go before feeling cold and dirty, is quite lousy as an entertaining horror piece, its overall quality just all sorts of bad. If all of this tickled your curiosity, then, a word of advise, prepare a barf bag...

Bodycount:

1 male stabbed in the eye with an icepick

1 female beaten to death against a steering wheel

1 female disemboweled with a knife

1 male bashed to death against a wall

1 female stabbed on the throat with a kitchen knife

1 female head seen (flashback)

1 male strangled, head beaten with a pipe

1 female knifed to death

1 female disemboweled with a knife

Total: 9

Me Hoy Minoy!: Shiver Me Timbers (2025)

Shiver Me Timbers (United Kingdom, 2025)

Rating: **1/2

Starring: Murdo Adams, Stephen Corrall, Paul Dewdney

Popeye The Slayer Man? Popeye's Revenge? And now, Shiver Me Timbers?! It looks like 2025 is going to be the year of Popeye slashers thanks to the old cartoon sea dog entering public domain and while I am not totally sure if I'm on board with this trend of vilifying heroic ole' Popeye The Sailor Man as a slasher monster, so long as the oddity of it all keeps it entertaining, I guess.

And odd is exactly the word for this one; taking place in 1986, siblings Ollie and Castor Oyl tag along their friends to camp out at a Northern Californian backwoods and watch the meteor shower accompanying Halley's comet, as well as the occasional booze chugging, weed smoking and premarital sexy time! In between all of this casualness, they nearly run over an old sailor guy who's out there to fish and, too, stop a pair of violent punks from beating up a poor vagrant who, in turn, doomsays that the comet is Evil!!!

True enough, a teeny-tiny piece of a meteor happens to float into the aforementioned sailor guy's pipe, which he thought nothing of and proceeds to smoke it. Little did he know, huffing and puffing the space rock has otherworldly consequences, mainly being mutated into a brawny monster man with a cartoonishly deformed face, with nothing but brutal murder in mind.

That said, guess who this mutant Popeye just happens to stumble upon no soon after?

With an obvious low budget and a firm tongue pressed in a cheek, Shiver me Timbers (2025) practically embraced the absurdity of making a slasher movie out of Popeye the Sailor Man, throwing in a weird premise involving deadly meteor showers, excessively splattery kills and one of the funniest looking Popeye killer so far, dubbed 'Monster Popeye", into a melting pot full of bad cheese! Granted that the shoestring production can get really distracting with all the bargain bin visuals populated by laughably bad computer graphics and store-bought practical effects, not to mention the caricature-quality character writing and acting, as well as the numerous sloppy editing, that's kinda the fun point of this movie. It's so bad, it's sort of respectable for how silly it can get! 

Shiver Me Timbers (2025) never feels like the kind of movie that'll detail why a meteor fragment caused one old sailor to hulk-out into a killer juggernaut, or go deep into Ollie's dilemma about leaving for college. No, it's the kind where a mutant man rips off a fat bloke's head while the fella uses an outhouse, and then follow the murder up with the head living long enough to horribly witness his killer pop a squat down on his freshly decapitated neck stump. Or have a finale that's greatly inspired by Evil Dead II (1987) as Ollie finds a giant gas-powered buzzsaw constructed by an crazy wheelchair-bound coot and do battle with it against a savage sailor man who, at that point, starts uttering Popeye quotes. It's the kind of movie that, honestly, isn't going to win a big crowd, but will sit well for those who wouldn't mind wasting a good hour and ten-ish minutes on a juvenile slasher littered with trashy charms and nasty kills just for the giggles!

In all honesty, the fact that we have a killer Popeye as a villain for a story that has barely anything to do with the cartoons is pretty much telling that Shiver Me Timbers (2025) is meant to be a joke. How well you take this joke, though, may depend on your tolerance for bad movies. Really bad movies. What say you, sailor?

Bodycount:

1 male had his head pulverized with a punch

1 male had his head torn off

1 male skewered through the arse with a baseball bat, exits to mouth

1 female seen decapitated

1 female gets a meteorite through the head

1 male found dismembered

1 male dunked inside a barrel of toxic waste, melted

1 male beaten to death with a wooden plank

1 male stomped on the head

1 male nearly sliced in half by an oversized gas-powered buzzsaw (?)

Total: 10 (?)

A Birthday Wish To Perish: The Debutantes (2017)

The Debutantes (Philippines, 2017)
Rating: *
Starring: Sue Ramirez, Miles Ocampo, Michelle Vito

Stop me if you heard this before: a weird lonesome girl gets befriended by someone from a popular clique and then invited to a party where she's humiliated by a prank, resulting to unspeakable horrors to those responsible.

Yep, that's Stephen King's Carrie. 

The Debutantes (2017) by Filipino director Prime Cruz is basically this for a good deal of the run, following quiet kid Kate (Sue Ramirez) as she befriends her classmate and neighbor Lara (Mile Ocampo) while helping her out with some math lessons. Grateful for getting her grades up, Lara invites Kate to a debut party (A Filipino celebration of a girl's 18th birthday) where Lara's circle of bullying buddies, unfortunately, decide to traumatize the lonesome girl by undoing the top of her dress, revealing some rather unsettling scars to the entire crowd. Humiliated, Kate rushes home, while Lara, who wasn't in on the so-called prank, chastises the group for their actions.

It isn't long before something is making sure the girls are properly punished for their part on embarrassing Kate, involving ghostly doppelgangers, a creature that kinda looks like a man made from soggy black mush, and deaths. Uncreative, boring, vanilla deaths.

I mean, the first kill was staged pretty okay, with creepy visuals, some good tension with the possessed self-diving car, and a good bloody payoff at the end. But the rest, we have someone getting strangled with a necklace, an abuser suffering a heart attack, and a swimmer getting drowned. Not, uh, not really impressed, sad to say. As if the predictable plotting and twists aren't lame enough to slowly knock me out into sleeping. (A twist character here is only onscreen whenever Kate is around. Who wouldn't connect the dots and see that reveal coming?!)

Cinematography is alright, though, I'll give the movie that. Acting is so-and-so, focusing a lot on the teenage dramatics in the film's attempt to establish some form of depth around its really small casts. (Like, really small. Where the hell are these girls' parents?) The quick pacing of the direction, its paper-thin characters and an abundance of hammy lines, however, didn't do much good for The Debutantes (2017)'s approach on emotional and psychological turmoil, resulting to a very stale horror shlock that's been done better.

Needless to say, The Debutantes (2017) is a supernatural slasher hokum I find hard to praise as there's hardly anything to praise at all. The story is done to death, the deaths lack spectacle, and the spectacle is missing in its execution. What else is there to say but go watch Carrie (1976) instead. Or Evilspeak (1981) if you're in a slasher mood. 

Bodycount:

1 female gets into a car collision against a truck, smashes through a windshield

1 female strangled with a necklace

1 female drowned in a pool

1 male suffers a heart attack (flashback)

1 female stabbed in the gut with a knife

1 female killed offscreen

Total: 6

We Are The Monsters, Babes: Get Away (2024)

Get Away (United Kingdom, 2024)
Rating: ***1/2

Starring: Nick Frost, Aisling Bea, Maisie Ayres

For the Smiths - Daddy Richard (Nick Frost), Mummy Susan (Aisling Bea), and angsty teen siblings Jessie (Maisie Ayres) and Sam (Sebastian Croft) - their holiday vacation to the small Swedish island of Svälta is the bonding experience they need as a family, especially when the divergent dynamics between the parents and the kids make a lot of conversations and activities awkward. The people they come across along the way, though, thinks their plan to visit and stay on Svälta is a terrible idea as the mainlanders there, lead by an ill-tempered crone (Anita Suikkari), doesn't take too kindly to outsiders, especially when their Karantan festival is nearing, celebrating a 19th century British-led massacre that drove its survivors into cannibalism.

And, to no one's surprise, the islanders aren't too pleased to see the family, even more so when they learn that one of Susan's ancestors took part of the massacre and she trivializes their traditions as a simple show to be gawked at. It isn't long before the residents of Svälta start showing up in the middle of the night wearing folk masks and tossing dead animals at the house the Smiths rented, not to mention the odd creaking noises coming from somewhere inside said house and the troubling sight of enough coffins for four being loaded onto boats. Believing the unwanted arrivals are a sign, the island elders ponder on the possibility to do a proper Karantan, a chance to resurrect a dormant tradition involving murder and the taste of fresh human flesh...

For the first hour, Get Away (2024) clashes the likes of folk horror inspired by movies such as The Wicker Man (1973) and Midsommar (2019), with the bumbling comedy of a family under constant confrontations and awkward situations just trying to get through their holiday by being as polite as possible, to the point many obvious red flags are ignored. While some of the jokes are a hit-or-miss with its tired jabs at vegan diets or culture clashes, the story itself is made tolerable by the entertainingly dysfunctional interactions of the Smiths as they get on each other's nerves, but open to surprisingly wholesome moments like Richard sharing his youthful experience with recreational weed with his daughter, or chuckle-worthy conversations about moist waffles during a family breakfast. 

The islanders, sadly, didn't get the same in-depth treatment considering most of them are portrayed as one-note fodder, filling out backgrounds as angry locals glaring daggers and being rude to the Smiths. The only one with any real sense of character is the head Svälta elder, who passionately believes the community she leads has lost its edge over the years, that it's about time they go back and hold the Karantan as it is intended to be, a gory vengeful act upon those who wrong them. We also got one Matts Larsson (Eero Milonoff), who owns the house the Smiths are renting and hinted to have something sinister planned for the family, though he's practically reduced to a creeper with a fetish for lingerie and voyeurism, spending his time on the movie being just pervertedly gross and upsetting. 

With only so much material to work around the premise of a hapless family butting heads with angry Swedes, the pacing did get a tad draggy near the film's climax, though this is remedied greatly by Get Away (2024)'s third and final act; without giving away much, let's just say the promised massacre did happen, just not in the way you may have expected. It's a killing spree that saved the movie for me, the sheer lunacy and maniac energy of it all bringing out a dementedly dark humor as the killers hack, stab, gut and decapitate everyone on sight, all the while sharing homely banter and playful teasing, reminiscing about old times and even sing gentle lovelies with one another. Some unfortunates do fight back, even managing to land a jab or two against the maniacs, which keeps the slaying fields all fair and fun, as well as interesting down to the cornball finale. This abrupt turn on who the prey and predators are may not sit well for some folks, but you got to hand it to the film, it's a very good twist on the account of all the shocks and surprises!

From cult-like folk horror to berserker slasher, all done with a British tongue pressed firmly against a cheek, Get Away (2024) may have its shortcomings, but the pay off in the end makes sitting through it worth every minute! Patient gorehounds be delighted!

Bodycount:

1 female stabbed in the neck with a kitchen knife

1 male stabbed in the neck with a kitchen knife

1 male knifed to death

1 male seen dying from a head wound

1 male seen murdered

1 male stabbed in the gut with a butterfly knife 

1 male knifed in the temple

1 female had her throat slashed with daggers

1 male stabbed in the chest with a push knife

4 victims seen dead

1 male gets a thrown hatchet to the back

1 female knifed in the gut

1 male seen being hacked to death

1 victim knifed in the head

1 female slashed across with a knife

1 female repeatedly knifed, ran through with a pike

1 male seen on fire

1 male seen being stabbed to death

1 female slashed across with a razor

1 male decapitated with a sword

1 male ran through with a sword

1 male stabbed to death

1 male knifed in the neck

1 victim seen on fire

5 heads seen 

1 male seen dead from a head wound 

1 male had his throat slashed with a knife

1 female had her head blown off with a shotgun

1 male shot to death

Total: 36

A Night To Be Mental: Spithood (2024)

Spithood (2024)

Rating: ***

Starring: Thibul Nettle, Claudia Bonifazio, Natasha Wanganeen

Sometimes you can simply enjoy a slasher just for being a slasher; give a killer a cool and intimidating look, sic the maniac out on some meat bags, have the victims be killed off creative ways, and you have a movie equivalent of junk food. Shallow. Sans deep. But, hey, it's fun! In a morbid way.

Indie Ozploitation slasher Spithood (2024) could have been this simple horror entertainment and, for most parts, it is; the remaining staff of a soon-to-be closed mental hospital were preparing for their last shift when they're informed that the police are dropping off one more patient, a juggernaut of a man wearing the titular spithood. The fella, Paul Atkins (Matt Connelly), is to be evaluated for an insanity plea, understandably so seeing he brutally slaughtered five women after his family got killed in a hit-and-run. Initially confined to a locked cell, it isn't long before Atkins somehow escapes from captivity, racing through hallways and cubicles savagely murdering whoever he comes across.

Advertised as Australia's first film written by First Nation people without referencing their roots, as well as starring three indigenous casts as leads (Natasha Wanganeen, Thibul Neetle and Luana Pohe), Spithood (2024) follows the slasher structure to its core in a short yet slick 58 minute run. It wastes no time getting into the bodycounting action once all the players are introduced, showcasing thrilling cat-and-mouse chases and plenty of stalking throughout near-empty corridors and rooms, all under the presence of a maniac whose eerie silence heightens his unsettling aggressiveness, particularly whenever he prefers to use his own strength to beat and stomp his victims to death. It's fairly bloody, never too gory, leaning on a more subtle display of violence by utilizing shadows and implications of savagery through clever editing and camera work, punctuated with copious amount of blood splatter and pulped bodies to be seen after a moment or two.

You could say, for a small production and director Tim Pine's debut film, there's genuine effort to be found in Spithood (2024), something I cannot say the same for its writing, sadly; personally, I take no issues on the fact that our characters stumble down the same clichéd route of being one-dimensional disposable fodder doing silly slasher victim mistakes like splitting up, but I do think it wouldn't hurt to flesh them out a tad more when the plot appears to be building up to something. It's later brought up in the story that it's impossible for Atkins to escape on his own, which means someone among them let him out on purpose, thus giving us a bit of mystery to work on as to who and why? Unfortunately, the narrative fails to execute this without punching more than one holes in the story, leading to a lot of incidents and twists not adding up at all, as well as its supposedly shocking finale being more of a headscratcher by the time the credits roll. 

Questionable writing aside, there's enough to recommend here in Spithood (2024) for slasher fans who love a generous helping of bloody kills and a frightfully menacing killer. It's not reinventing anything and, frankly, that's alright; not every good film has to be high art! If you're in it for a quick and easy bodycounter horror, then this film is ready to provide!

Bodycount:

1 male beaten to death

1 female strangled, stomped to death

1 male repeatedly brained with a wrench

1 female hacked on the head with a cleaver

1 female smothered with a garbage bag

1 male attacked, killed offscreen

1 male suffers a heart attack

1 male stabbed to death with a fountain pen

Total: 8

Crazy Crazy Carousel Rides: Halloween Park (2023)

Halloween Park (Karusell) (Sweden, 2023) (AKA "Carousel")
Rating: ***

Starring: Wilma Lidén, Omar Rudberg, Amanda Lindh

It was one Halloween night when Fiona Wilma Lidén) tagged along her weird friend Petra (Amanda Nilsson) to a costume party for a fun time, only for it all to go horribly wrong. Like 'Petra wigging out, getting harassed by partygoers and then later found dead in the morning' kind of wrong.

Exactly a year later, it'll be another Halloween night when the past catches up to Fiona, who now works at Gothenburg's Liseberg amusement park, as she's instructed to spend the night shift accompanying a small VIP group as they enjoy the place all to themselves, from the bumper cars to the roller coaster. The guests, much to Fiona's uneasiness, turns out to be her former friends who were all present during that fiasco with Petra, most of who are upset at her now for leaving the group and blaming them for the girl's demise. Resentfully, Fiona does her best to work with the gang all the while keeping the peace and enforcing park rules, even rekindling some sparks with her old crush, Dante (Omar Rudberg), who's currently dating the group queen bee Jenny (Amanda Lindh). 

It's literally fun and game until the power suddenly goes out for the park, trapping everyone inside, and someone wearing dead Petra's Halloween mask (plus pig-tails!) starts thinning down the group one murder at a time. With a killer hellbent on ending them all, Fiona and the gang have no choice but to stick together to try surviving the night and get out alive... 

Halloween Park (2023) is, frankly, everything you'd expect from a basic slasher film; it opens with a character dying, it skips ahead some time later and those who were somewhat connected with the tragedy starts to get snuffed out by someone who is clearly doing it out of revenge. The classic set-up. Nothing is added here, not even a few additional layers of depth for its characters to up the stakes and engagement, or a bit of creativity towards who's who behind the mask. It's all a familiar walk in the park and, frankly, I do see this as an issue for horror fans who were expecting a tad more pizzazz for their bodycounting kicks. Yet, still, if you're not in a demanding streak and doesn't overly mind predictability, then this movie's 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' direction and plotting might do well for you.

Once the slayings begin, Halloween Park (2023) utilizes all it could with the isolated theme park settings, using empty haunt houses and merry-go-rounds as potential prowling spots between the killer and the teens in a macabre game of hide-and-seek. While the kills themselves are not overly gruesome, they mostly done away in fun set-pieces, a decent bunch of them involving roller coasters like one poor fella who gets axed while riding one, forcing their friends to watch in horror as they're unable to do anything to help seeing they're locked in their seats. The massacre's emphasis is clearly more on splash and splatter than vile viscera, and seeing the resulting bodycount, I say it done the assignment suitably enough for its thrills. With their mechanic get-up and broken doll mask combo, the simplistic design of the killer also adds a few good points. 

Not particularly exciting, but an alright holiday slasher offering. 

Bodycount:

1 female seen dead

1 male hacked on the chest with an axe

1 female had her wrist repeatedly slice open with a box cutter, hacked with an axe

1 male decapitated with an axe

1 male had his throat cut with a knife

1 male falls to his death

Total: 6

Film School Flopped: Harpy (2000)

Harpy (South Korea, 2000)

Rating: *

Starring: Lee Jung-hyun, Kim Rae-won, Ggoch-ji Kim

When a movie starts with a film class meeting where you could barely comprehend what the teacher is saying because the chatter from his students can be heard along his little talk, or the damn thing pauses randomly for the sake of creative editing, you know friggin' well this isn't gonna end good for any of us.

While working on an amateur slasher flick for a school project, shy musical prodigy Su-yeon (Lee Jung-hyun) falls for the motorbike-riding bad boy Hyeon-su (Kim Rae-won), who just so happens to be dating the class queen bee Yae-rim (Ggoch-ji Kim). As you would expect from a love triangle, drama and intrigue ensue, especially after someone begins to stalk Su-yeon and Hyeon-su with a camera after the two start seeing each other in secret. Photos of the meet-up are soon passed around school and Yae-rim, of course, isn't too pleased to know that her squeeze is squeezing another girl behind her back, so she corners and attacks Su-yeon at their classroom after spotting her working late one night, only for us to see another figure walking in to kill off the attacked girl no soon after. 

Or at least that's what it looked like as, a few days passed being absent, Su-yeon reappears looking rather okay despite the whole assault, much to Yae-rim's surprise and uneasiness. Su-yeon does appear to be quieter than usual, though, but with her being back on board, the film class can now proceed with their hack' n slash movie project and visit a remote villa where they'll be filming. This is when the shoot goes South for the gang as not only would they discover their props tampered with to cause actual harm, but someone dressed up as their balaclava-clad villain starts hunting them down one by one...

Now, see, Harpy (2000) here had the potential to be at least a serviceable enough murder mystery despite its sappy love triangle one hour act and often wonky characters. It's not a perfect plot, you can actually tell the twist from afar, but it at has the spirit of a passable yet fun B-grade slasher that you could catch whenever nothing else is good to watch on a weekend afternoon. This would have been the case if only, ONLY it wasn't edited into a schizophrenic dreck by people I assume were suffering from a mental breakdown. Or were high. Or both.

Basically, any sense of a stable direction was completely lost within all the noise and stylistic visuals our editor from hell decided to give this film, filling Harpy (2000) with a gobblecock of cartoon noises, randomized freeze frames and slowmo shots, odd voice overs spouting the most random shite here and there, apparently as a way to market this movie as a "horror comedy" in which, from what I read looking into this mess, wasn't even supposed to be the case. Based on what I can properly decipher, it was shot as a (mostly) straight slasher, but the added bells and whistles transformed it into an art house film experiment of the chaotic kind, one that failed to explain its own jokes or reward our patience with worthwhile entertainment. If anything, the whole shtick may have alienated it audience considering its sad box office performance and its relative obscurity. I wouldn't be surprised if none of the people who watched this could make head nor tail of what they're seeing here.

Harpy (2000) is, without a doubt, an experience. Just not a good one. Undoubtedly one of the strangest slasher titles I've seen out there, as well as, sadly, one of the more frustrating to sit through... 

Bodycount:

1 female beaten, stabbed with knife offscreen 

1 male snared with a chained grappling hook, later found hanging dead from a ceiling

1 female strangled with a chained grappling hook

1 female stabbed in the back

1 female stabbed in the chest with a dagger

1 male gets a knife pushed into his throat (mostly offscreen)

1 male knifed to death

1 male strangled to death with a chained grappling hook

Total: 8

Tickle Me Simon: Puppet Killer (2019)

Puppet Killer (Canada, 2019)

Rating: ***

Starring: Aleks Paunovic, Lee Majdoub, Lisa Durupt

A slasher with a killer muppet. Right. Normally, I would say 'Now, I've seen everything', but knowing how weird the horror subgenre can get at the most random times, I'm pretty sure there will be weirder shit out there waiting for me to discover. Still, the hell did I just watch with this one?

Ever since he was just a little baby, Jamie knows three things; he's never too young for good movies, his fluffy puppet Simon will always be his bestfriend and his love for his die-hard horror fan mom will be forever, even if cancer decided to take her from him so early from his life. Still, young Jamie tries to keep his love for dear mum alive by continuing a family tradition of watching shlocky B-grade horror flicks every Christmas, something his eventual stepmother finds rather uncomfortable to the point she lost it one night and starts trashing away his memorabilia. Unfortunately for her, someone didn't like this. Someone small. Fluffy. Wielding a deadly kitchen knife.

Flashforward ten years later, we now see Jamie as a high schooler (played by Aleks Paunovi who happens to be in his fifties...) and he's very much convinced his puppet pal Simon may have killed his stepmom. His dad, the ever supportive guy that he is, simply believes his son has quite the imagination and dismisses the claims (Or at least he's trying to), though Jamie's school counselor appears to take the fella's ramblings a little more seriously. Not that she believes him, of course, but she does constantly reminds him to take his meds, fearing something more psychological might be at play here.

Jamie, however, thinks he should get his closure from all of this killer puppet talk in his own terms and decided to do this by drunkenly relaxing this Christmas holiday with his girlfriend and friends (all teenagers played by people in their 40s...) at the old family cabin up in the woods where it all happened. Beers get chugged. Bonfires get razed. Some of Jamie's friends get it on at a jacuzzi. And who else but lil' Simon gets found hidden away in the basement, tucked inside a box of Christmas decors, much to Jamie's uneasiness.

Needless to say, this holly jolly cabin celebration isn't gonna stay jolly for too long as Simon, strangely enough, does turn out to be alive and pretty much homicidal, slashing a mean kill count as he goes after one middle-aged teenager at a time!

So, yeah, this is a movie where teenagers are played by grown men and women, being terrorized by a pink fuzzy puppet who sounds a lot like Elmo from Sesame Street. I think it's safe to say that Puppet Killer (2019) shouldn't be taken seriously at all and, hell, I think its own production knows that! It's a weird take on your typical cabin-in-the-woods hack'n slash, with our lead guy practically portraying an overly enthusiastic man-child and nearly everybody else is a swing on your classic slasher victims from the overly horny couple to the brooding emo kid and his frustrated stoner brother, all done with over-the-top performances that are purposely delivered in egregious tongue-in-cheek! There's a bit of a charm to how bizarre this direction is, frankly, even more so when the film eventually starts its killing spree; Simon simply goes muppet maniac on everyone in the cabin, throwing squeaky voiced one-liner giggles, donning costumes parodying top-of-the-line slasher villains like Jason Voorhees, Freddy Krueger and Michael Myers, as well as dishing out surprisingly gnarly practical gore and kills for such a goofy little psychopath!

Out of all this craziness, though, what really caught me off guard is how much mood whiplash Puppet Killer (2019) planned for its finale; needless to say, it teased around the idea that all of this could have been the result of a broken psyche and the movie really took its time playing with this notion with Jamie practically under Simon's mercy, reducing him into a sobbing, blabbering mess. It's a sharp contrast to the mostly cheesy, joke-littered satirical horror jab that makes up a bulk of the film and it would have been a daringly grim ending to leave everything at if it wasn't for one final twist, a last minute shot implying something... otherworldly.

There's no doubt Puppet Killer (2019)'s one of the stranger slasher flicks I've ever come across and, as peculiar as it sounds, I sortah dig it! As a dumb hammy horror comedy, it's quirky and energetic, generous in splatter and occasionally creepy, it's a real fun mess that I'm sure will resonate with those who have the taste for the quaint and batty!

Bodycount:

1 female succumbs to cancer

1 female knifed to death

1 male garroted, dismembered with a meat cleaver

1 female drowned in a jacuzzi

1 male shot in the eye with an arrow

1 female gets a thrown machete to the head

1 male gutted with a clawed glove

1 female garroted, later found gutted

1 female had her throat sliced with a knife

Total: 9

Mukhayam Alshaati Aldamawii: Camp (2008)

Camp (Egypt, 2008) (AKA "Kamb")

Rating: ***

Starring: Yasmen Abaza, Amr Abdelaziz, Amr Abdullatif

It's not very often we see a horror film straight out of Egypt due to the country's strict censorship, so the fact that we even got this teen slasher from them is no short of a miracle and a real ham of a treat for us bodycount fans. 

The scene starts at a luxurious birthday party of one Wael, who we see having a bit of a talk with his on-again-off-again fiancé Shirin before she has to leave on the account of a family emergency. Right about that time, the rather beautiful Shaky arrives with her date Gamal to join the festivities and then the story jumps ahead a year later. And Shaky is now dead.

After visiting her grave, Wael, Shirin, Gamel and the rest of their gang (plus Shirin's kid sister for some reason) drive to the titular camp, which is less of a camp and more of a nearly-barren hotel manned by its owner and his promiscuous wife, a trolley guy with a case of sticky fingers and a mute cleaning lady who eyes the guests suspiciously. The group's there to celebrate their graduation by having a great time at the beach, dining fine and dancing around a bonfire to some spicy salsa music. Trouble comes bickering when talk of romance, cheating and doing the nasty out of wedlock gets brought up within the group, but that would soon escalate to more dire problems like random fires down hallways, creepy shadows looming across windows and their cars' batteries going dead. 

Dire turns deadly when a killer resembling a pale ghoul shows up to terrorize the doomed partyers, stabbing and hacking people to death, stirring up a whole mess of accusations and suspicions as the victims try to uncover who's hunting them all down...

Focused more on building suspense and intrigue rather than a high kill count or a messy spot of gore, Camp (2008) works its way through the interpersonal problems and relations of its casts for a good bulk of the plot, building enough drama and red herrings for the eventual killing spree to make it as twisty in its turns as possible. It's an approach that would've functioned better if it wasn't for the bits of comedic outings that clash with the movie's more serious moments, not to mention the sudden amount of overacting and breakneck editing around the second half which knocks off any earnest sense of chill or fright from the murders. Still, the film is shot with a modest quality and there's an undeniable fun factor to be found so long as you don't mind a dose of cheese and what's practically a run-fest of victims fleeing all over the hotel while the killer either legs after them or show off their parkour skills. It doesn't always fly well, nor does it make sense, but it's gorgeous to look at and it surely does help not to overthink how quickly our killer can change in and out of their cosplay-level disguise, among many other things.

The kills aren't too graphic and are mostly implied offscreen to appease Egypt's censors, not quite that big of a problem personally since the scenes around the attacks work well enough entertainment-wise. The finale is, shall we say, up for the audience's interpretation: it would have been your standard unmasking and reveal with a flashback to compliment the twist, only made just that complicated and confusing by adding one little detail that simply doesn't make any lick of sense at all. The film just threw it at us at the near end and left it at that, but the very gist of the whole fiasco's basically one big revenge plot and so long as that's clear at least, I can roll with it.

Camp (2008) undoubtedly could have been better, but for what it is able to accomplish, I can appreciate. It has the look and feel of an 80s slasher done right, one that isn't too coy on hamming it a bit with its thrills and spills. A neat little bodycounter flick from a different culture!

Bodycount:

1 male hacked on the neck with a curved knife

1 female found dead from a cut throat

1 female hacked on the head with a curved knife

1 male stabbed in the back with a curved knife

1 female stabbed in the back with a curved knife

1 male found stabbed in the back with a curved knife

1 female killed offscreen, later found stabbed in the chest with a curved knife

1 male found stabbed on the back with a curved knife

Total: 9

That's The Way To Do It: Punch (2023)

Punch (United Kingdom, 2023)

Rating: ***

Starring: Kierston Wareing, Jamie Lomas, Alina Allison

Oh I do like to be beside the seaside

Oh I do like to be beside the sea

Oh I do like to walk along the prom prom prom

Where the brass band plays tiddly-om-pom-pom

For those who are not in the know, Punch and Judy is a traditional puppet show featuring Mr. Punch and his wife Judy, following their often violent misadventures as Mr. Punch solves his way through various problems and foes with a beating stick. It's a staple attraction found at British seaside scenes and an occasional subject and inspiration for a few horror titles like Dolls (1987), Funny Man (1994) and a segment from an overlook horror anthology, Screamtime (1983). Now, we see good ole' Mr. Punch take the slasher mantle as an envisioned boogeyman stalking teenagers in this British bodycounter.

Wanting closure before heading back to university, Frankie (Alina Allison) decided to have one more night out with her friends as a bittersweet farewell to them and this uneventful coastal hometown life she's desperate to escape from. This evening of drugs, drunks and drama, however, gets tainted in blood when a local legend, a masked-figure known as Mr. Punch, begins creeping the seaside town for naughty people and giving them the business end of his bat. Punch spots Frankie and fancies on stalking her for the night, braining, breaking and burning as many victims along the way.

Much like its protagonist setting herself for more out of her mundane seaside life, Punch (2023) opted to do a bit more with the dead teenager horror plot by building its story around the dramatic discourse going on with its leading lady and the people she's surrounded by in her small town; some are with her in her plans of leaving the place despite feeling a tad sad about it, while others are simply downright opposed to the idea of her wanting out. This works surprisingly well as the writing actually gives the small main casts a noticeable level of depth and weight, even if they occasionally dip down into doing your typical slasher victim fodder of drinking, getting high and partying, not to mention the fact that the actors playing them gave a refreshingly subtle and modest performance, making the characters likeable enough compared to some of the tad annoying secondary casts.

On the slasher side of things, Punch (2023) does an admirable job doing its own demented little spin on the Punch and Judy puppet play aesthetic within its titular boogeyman and their kills; the murders are mostly bloody beatings with a bat while the killer spouts wise-cracks through a high-pitched voice mod, similar to how the Punch puppet deals with its foes and the little catchphrases it squeaks. This lack of variety may not do well for some slasher fans, admittedly, but I find the sheer craziness of Punch's manic clowning and playful brutality as he mocks and jokes around while shoving bats down people's throats bizarrely fun, even if the voice effect does make it difficult to work out what Mr. Punch is saying sometimes. The identity behind the mask was also a bit of a let down seeing it wasn't that hard to figure it out (clues were given early on the film), there's at least a nice second twist reveal in the near end which further ties into the puppet show lore quite nicely, in a small town folk horror way. (Do feel the film could have benefitted further from more night scenes around the empty seaside parks, though. More dread in isolation. Perhaps with a bigger budget...)

Albeit flawed, Punch (2023) is an okay Euro-horror flick that sticks to the basics; it's all evenly paced, generous with its bloodletting and, most importantly, features a freaky yet fun slasher villain with an effectively creepy look, all things any slasher fan can enjoy and appreciate. An easy slasher treat that packs a fair punch!

Bodycount:

1 male brained with a baseball bat

1 female had her jaw broken with a shoved baseball bat

1 female had her neck broken

1 male brained with a baseball bat, stomped

1 male brained with a baseball bat

1 male had his face caved in with a baseball bat

1 female beaten on the face with an audio console

1 female killed offscreen

1 male brained against a sink

1 male beaten to death with a baseball bat

1 male had his neck crushed with a baseball bat

1 female thrown into a bonfire

1 female brained to death with a baseball bat

1 male beaten to death with a baseball bat

1 male knifed in the gut

1 female brained with a baseball bat

Total: 16

Into The Woods, Down The Hill: Mercy Falls (2023)

Mercy Falls (United Kingdom, 2023)

Rating: *1/2

Starring: Lauren Lyle, Nicolette McKeown, James Watterson

As a child, Rhona caught a glimpse of an incident involving her father and an injured horse, a moment in her life that troubled her so much that her relationship with him strained to the point she barely visited him as an adult. Now that her father passed away, Rhona learns that she inherited their old family cabin up in the Scottish Highlands, so she plans a hiking trip through the moors with her boyfriend and a couple of friends to visit the place and see what became of it. Along the way, they tagged along a lone traveler named Carla, who may or may not have a bit of screws loose after the horrors she faced back when she was deployed to fight a war at Afghanistan. 

As the day goes by, the would-be jovial hike begins to devolve into an intense stay when romantic and sexual tensions between the group have them arguing and quarreling with one another. When push comes to a literal shove, the gang soon find themselves in a situation they weren't prepared for as one of them ends up dying and someone's sudden spring of bloodlust have them hunting and hacking the rest of the group.

Looking past the gorgeously scenic camera work and the good enough acting talent presented here, Mercy Falls (2023) feels like it was robbed of an opportunity to do a better story seeing, prior to anyone from the group biting the big one, the narrative seems to be heading more on a direction focusing on the psychological horrors of trauma and distrust. It dances around the rising tension within the gang as they question the credibility of their friendship and love life, as well as the mental health of the few joining them after catching one too many suspicious activities the longer they stay outdoors, but that's eventually tossed away for a more traditional survivalist-type backwoods slasher run once one of them decided to give an unfortunate fella the knife-across-the-throat treatment after concluding he didn't have long to live with a big stick impaling his thigh. The mercy killer is then found out to have stayed at a mental ward and, just because they couldn't trust the group anymore, opted to hack and slash their way through them.

This unfortunately cheapens the rest of the movie since the killer's motive could have been explored further for better thrills but, rather, Mercy Falls (2023) went ahead with the usual simplification of PTSD equaling to homicidal tendencies, thus making the mad maniac here genuinely unremarkable. Pairing this misfire with a predictable and overlong stalk-and-stab situation, as well as murders that are barely captivatingly splashy or gory, and you would, in due course, get to climactic showdown that's disappointingly isn't anywhere as satisfying or impactful as it could have been due to its lack of tension and personality. Really underwhelming stuff here bearing in mind how well the movie starts.

If you're not in a very demanding mood, then Mercy Falls (2023) makes a suitable timewaster, I guess. It has enough production quality to look good and, honestly, I have seen worse backwoods killing sprees out there, but you can also do better than this downhill tumble from high ground to flat dirt. Good plot, terrible execution.  

Bodycount:

1 male had his throat cut with a combat knife (flashback)

1 male stabbed to death with a combat knife (flashback)

1 male had his throat cut with a hunting knife 

1 female shot on the neck (flashback)

1 male hacked to death with a hiking pick

1 female hanged

1 male stabbed in the gut with a hunting knife

1 female set ablaze by a gasoline-doused flaming torch

Total: 8

Broken and Vengeful: Bedevilled (2010)

Bedevilled (Kim Bok-nam salinsageonui jeonmal) (South Korea, 2010)

Rating: ****1/2

Starring: Seo Yeong-hie, Ji Seong-won, Min-ho Hwang

Evil triumphs when good men do nothing.

Hoping to escape the busy bustle of Seoul's big city life, as well as the troubles that come with it like a stressful office environment and being a witness of an assault, Hae-won decided to take a week long vacation at her home island, Moo-do, and spend some time with her childhood friend, Bok-nam, who have been writing letters to her. Little does she know, however, are the daily horrors Bok-nam suffer at the hands of the few remaining islanders living there as not only is she berated and shunned by the island women for not meeting their outdated norms of a dutiful and loyal wife, but she also physically and sexually abused by her brutish spouse and sleazy brother-in-law. Her only respite to all of her suffering is her daughter Yeon-hee and the fleeting chance of escaping her hellish island life to Seoul. A chance that might finally be at reach with Hae-won's arrival and help.

Unfortunately, despite Bok-nam's pleas and horrifying suspicions that Yeon-hee is being groomed by her own father, Hae-won turns a blind eye to the request, leading to Bok-nam taking matters at her own hands and attempt to leave the island with her daughter on her own. This only leads to a harrowing loss that finally breaks Bok-nam and, with Hae-won further refusing to help with the matter and the islanders' continuing maltreatment, a sickle is wielded and everyone will feel the wrath of a woman forever scorned...

Bedevilled (2010) is, without a doubt, one of the hardest movies for me to watch and I say that as a compliment to just how well it works not only a revenge-driven psychological slasher, but as a movie in general; for the first hour, it explores the extent of cruelty upon an undeserving party and the consequences of being a bystander, having us uncomfortably witness the full brunt of the abuse Bok-nam endures day by day, a matter that's actually encouraged by the aging island women whose mindsets are still stuck in the old gender norms of men being respected despite the stones they throw upon their spouses, and that a woman's job is only to be loyal to their husbands and do nothing but provide and serve. The film reaches to an extent that it brews a boiling sense of outrage from its audience, even more so when the film presented more than one chances for Bok-nam to be free of her horrible mistreatment, only for it to be swept away by hushed tongues, blind eyes and lies. It's a different kind of horror, one that hits a brand of realism all too well thanks Seo Yeong-hie's outstandingly heart-rending role and performance as the victim of all of these horrible deeds, and too the fact that despite Hae-won being presented as the main character of the plot, the direction and focus are mostly centered around Bok-nam's grueling hardships, making it quite easy to develop our sympathies for her plight.

Eventually, it all has to reach a breaking point and, after one irreversible act of violence, Bedevilled (2010) dives into a cathartic revenge-fueled murder spree as the islanders meet the bladed point of a sickle one by one. Necks hacked, heads decapitated, guts knifed, it's all as satisfying as it can get, a deserving pay-off filled with good gore, savage bloodletting and harrowing intensity after watching these villains haughtily justify their assault and persecutions for the longest time, reducing them to victims begging for their lives once the tables finally turn against them. And yet, in the midst of this eye-for-and-eye retribution play, there's an underlying feeling of misery and heartache as the film subtly reminds us that it didn't have to come to this bloodshed. There's no smile in Bok-nam's face as she murders these people. No quips. No fanfare. Just a stoic face, a broken spirit and pure methodic deaths that could have been prevented when the right people stepped in, a graze of complexity that has this bodycount achieving more in depth than just your regular horror film kill streak.

The final act is where Bedevilled (2010) works its emotionally-scarring character study into your typical slasher flick showdown as Hae-won sees herself trapped in a police station, the only officer there seemingly murdered, with a very maddened Bok-nam waiting there to finish what she started. It's the usual trappings of chase sequences, blows traded and a crazily gory last kill, but it's still punctuated with an emotional dour mood that's in line with the movie's cathartic development, ending on a bittersweet yet still devastating note that touches on the melancholic.

Admittedly, Bedevilled (2010) is not a movie for everyone. The brutality of the abuse shown can come to a point where it feels uncalled for, or at least have one welding a strong constitution to sit and bear it. At the end of it all, though, the promised conclusion is one to deliver and remember. One that rewards your patience and rage with a rush of psychological release through bloody sickle kills upon those who deserves it. If you think you're up to it, then see this unsung revenge masterpiece!

Bodycount:

1 female murdered offscreen

1 girl lands head-first on a rock

1 female hacked on the neck with a sickle

1 female hacked on the back of the head with a sickle

1 female hacked with a sickle

1 elderly female jumped off a cliff and landed on rocks

1 male decapitated with a sickle

1 male gutted with a knife, hacked to death with a sickle

1 male shredded through a boat propeller 

1 male bashed to death with a sledgehammer

1 female repeatedly shot, stabbed in the throat with a recorder flute

Total: 11

Blood-Splattered Saw Dust: The Carpenter (1988)

The Carpenter (Canada, 1988)

Rating: ***

Starring: Wings Hauser, Lynne Adams, Pierre Lenoir

Canada in the 80s pretty much gave us a good deal of golden age slasher cult classics like My Bloody Valentine (1981), Happy Birthday To Me (1981) and Prom Night (1980), but the country also brought upon a platter of weird ventures within the sub-genre such as the Dungeons and Dragons is Satanic-inspired Skullduggery (1983), the "Wendigo psychosis" leaning Ghostkeeper (1983) and this oddly surreal melodramatic bodycounter, The Carpenter (1988).  

The movie starts with the chillingly calm mental and emotional breakdown of housewife Alice Jarrett (Lynne Adams), who soon sees herself being taken away to a mental facility after her husband Martin (Pierre Lenoir) finds her cutting up one of his suits one day. Upon her release, Martin believes that a change of scenery is in order so he bought them a house at a countryside that's currently being worked on by a cheap and rowdy construction crew. That night, though, after the workers gone home, Alice is awakened by a lone carpenter (Wings Hauser) still busying himself down in the basement and the two have an unusually cordial conversation about his work, ending with Alice pretty much just leaving the guy to do whatever he needs to fix up the place.

Things go pretty hairy when Martin leaves for work one day, leaving Alice all on her lonesome when one of the crewmen got more than a tad tipsy drunk that evening and breaks into the house to assault her. Fortunately for our housewife in distress, her friendly neighborhood carpenter is there to protect her. Unfortunately for our would-be rapist, said protection involves getting both of his arms sliced off with a circular saw. (Not that he minds, apparently. He looked more bewilderedly inconvenienced about losing those limbs than, I dunno, in complete, horrifying pain!) 

Alice would soon learn that the house once belonged to a man named Edward Byrd who fell into massive debt in his obsession of making his home perfect, only to be executed after killing several of the repo men sent after him. Edward now haunts the house, still trying to finish it, and Alice is shockingly okay with this! So much so that when Ed starts murdering away more and more of the crewmen who he sees doing wrong to both the house and its new lovely owner, Alice has no qualms of him massacring these people and, in one scene, appears to be more upset at that fact that he's awfully messy with the slayings! 

Needless to say, Alice is swooned by Ed's pleasantly hunky demeanor and good work ethics, overlooking the whole homicidal lunacy that goes with the package, and the ghostly carpenter himself returns her infatuation, promising more bloodshed to whoever comes between them. 

Directed by David Wellington (who would later do a lot of TV work like Vikings and Orphan Black) and written by Doug Taylor (of Splice (2009) and A Christmas Horror Story (2015)), The Carpenter (1988) is a strange piece of 80s Canuxploitation bodycounter that builds itself more around the ghostly theatrics between Lynne Adam's mentally troubled spouse and Wing Hauser's unhinged gentleman of a paranormal handyman, only to juxtapose to the nasty killings here and there in an unusual dream-like direction. The result is often goofy as the supernatural psychodrama doesn't really have the solid footing to be as captivating as the unhealthy growing romance between the living and the undead implies here. Instead, it all comes out more hammy for how it is scripted, acted and edited, all sided with touches of eccentricities like the overuse of dissolves to transition from scene to scene or Alice's overly offbeat reactions, implying a form of crazed whimsy from her point of view. It's serviceable so long as you find the unintentional hilarity of the film's nutty arthouse aesthetic and as a slasher, The Carpenter (1988) ain't too bad.

The kills themselves aren't that loud and splashy (strange coming from a film that have power tools for murder weapons, honestly) and the pacing really do takes its time getting around to them, but I have to commend at just how odd the interactions are during and after each murder between Alice and Ed, as if the act of killing is just something the two can do and witness while talking about how good the weather is! It also helps that Wings Hauser is practically tailor-made for his role as the titular carpenter, doing the ole' wisecracking villain trope popularized by one Elm Street's Fred Krueger, only with a good dose of Southern politeness and neighborly sweetness that made a lot of his scenes an intriguing watch. His delivery is spot-on to the craziness of the villain, maniacally dispatching one poor soul a minute, being shy about it in the next. The movie did falter a little in its last act as all the oddities made about Alice being so nonchalant with all of the bloodshed gets discarded way too easily for a by-the-book horror finale, making the fantastical, rather upbeat turn of events feel kinda undeserved for how much it just came out of left field. 

Still, the majority of the product has some hokey charm to it, making The Carpenter (1988) a decent enough title for lovers of quirky horror and obscure slashers to try out. It's a sublime blend of several moods and ideas, mostly succeeding in its own curious yet entertaining way.

Bodycount:

1 male had his arms cut off with a circular saw, killed

1 male gets a belt sander to the face

1 male powerdrilled to the throat

1 female shot to death with a nail gun

1 male pinned to the floor with screwdrivers to the hands, head crushed with a vise

Total: 5