A Star is Torn: Pearl (2022)

Pearl (2022)

Rating: ****1/2

Starring: Mia Goth, David Corenswet, Tandi Wright

While Ti West's backwoods slasher X (2022) is a throwback shocker to 70s bodycounters and porn culture, his follow-up entry to this in-film universe is a loving yet nightmarish tribute to old Hollywood psycho-dramas, wherein we explore the maddened origins of a tragedy. A tragedy named Pearl.

It's 1918 and in the midst of Texas' Spanish flu outbreak; Pearl (Mia Goth) lives a life of near-isolation with her immigrant German parents, tending to their farm and running chores while her husband is out fighting a war in Europe. She wishes more to this life. More than cleaning after her wheelchair-bound invalid father. More than just trudging her days away following the orders of her joyless mother whose spirit was broken just to set foot in America. More than feeding animals and running to drug stores. No, Pearl wanted fame. To be Hollywood's next chorus girl, or even it's next biggest star. And she sees the opportunity for this when, while sneaking off to see a movie at the local town, she spots a dance audition to be held at her local church.

Though encouraged by her sister-in-law Mitsy and a handsome, young projectionist to try out, Pearl's enthusiasm for the chance gets seemingly crushed by her mother's stern and sharp tongue one fateful night, only to end in an accidental blaze which leaves the matron roasted and dying. Seemingly free from the weight of her parents dragging her down, Pearl sets her heart and feet to wow the judges with nothing but sheer determination and a head high in the clouds. 

Given, that is, she doesn't break down and continue her new found bloodlust for a spree killing, temper flaring and desperation growing...

With a collaborated script written by director Ti West and lead actress Mia goth during a mandatory 2-week COVID-19 quarantine at New Zealand prior to filming X (2022) (leading to both films being shot secretly back-to-back), Pearl (2022) is a dark coming-of-age character study showcasing the declining mental stability of the titular disturbed farm girl with illusions of grandeur and a boiling murder streak. Filled with lively technicolor and surreal imagery conjured up by Pearl's fantasies (this including a spectacular dance number with fireworks, and too a rather hilarious shot of a scarecrow with David Corenswet's head on it, injecting some bit of levity), the film sets us in a position to find sympathy for the Devil, a slowburn descent to madness carried powerfully by Goth's performance as she navigates her character from being uneasy yet sweet, to downright creepy and unhinged, a masterclass of acting that delivers horrors of both psychological and emotional kind.

Indeed, the story here is an exercise on resentment and turmoil, ripe with enough pulpy savagery as Pearl's horrifying confliction have her both enjoying and regretful of her terrible thoughts and deeds. One one end, she wants nothing but love and understanding from those around her, and yet she'll strike down with furious anger at the same folks the moment they do something that go against her wishes, cultivating to a third act that dishes out a body count, as well as an impressive screaming fit during the auditions and a five-minute single-take monologue that taps into Pearl's broken psyche when she's given the opportunity to let all the dirty laundry out, this including her murders. (Much to the requester's regret) Heck, even the end credits showcase just how broken Pearl would become, with the entire thing done with Goth simply holding out a smile to the camera for almost two minutes, face straining and eyes tearing up as the credits roll and Tyler Bater's impressive score transitions from disturbingly whimsy to haunting. (Though, apparently, this was unplanned;  Ti West refused to call "cut" during the shoot as he wanted to see how long Mia could hold up the smile, making the unhinged grimace uncanny rather effectively) 

As much of the focus centers more on Pearl's plight and ambitions, the kill count here isn't that high and about half of them occur offcamera, though those we do get to indulge onscreen did boast some worthwhile brutality and chunky gore effects, particularly one involving an axe murder that I believe is a tribute to the Joan Crawford proto-slasher Straight-Jacket (1964). The theme of sex as taboo is also looked into here as one of Pearl's repressed indulgences, in which she's so starved for love and attention that she's seeking courtship from anyone - or even anything- only to feel guilty, disgusted and shameful for herself for breaking her vows with her husband which further fuels her inner dilemmas.

Greatly a melodrama period piece with a slasher-adjacent climax, Pearl (2022) simply works. It just works! It's an impressive feat of horror fiction, creepy yet heartbreaking, chilling yet sympathetic, an unbridled dive down the mind and heart of a brand new horror icon that steals the show with grit and glee. Yes, it may take a while for the absolute gruesome to get going, but the path through the story has enough interest and drama to steal the scene, thus an overall rewarding watch for the patient. What else is there to say but see this gem of a film!

Bodycount:

1 male stabbed to death with a pitchfork

1 male smothered with a towel

1 female hacked to death with an axe

1 female dies from burn wounds

Total: 4

The Price of Fame: The Comeback (1978)

The Comeback (United Kingdom, 1978) (AKA "Encore", "The Day the Screaming Stopped")
Rating: ****
Starring: Jack Jones, Pamela Stephenson and David Doyle

Oh yes, Pete Walker! This is a name any slasher fan should be familiar with as the man directed, wrote and produced a fair number of reviled horror and titillating sexploitation movies back in the days, practically providing 70s British horror its share of gruesome proto-slashers such as The Flesh and Blood Show (1972), Frightmare (1974) and, one of my personal favorites of his, House of Mortal Sin (1976). Here, we see him basically laying out the stepping stone for various mystery-adjacent slasher flicks, focusing more on plotting and even managing to reel in American Grammy Award-winning straight-pop singer Jack Jones to lead. This is The Comeback (1978)!

After a six-year hiatus from the music industry and dealing with a crumbling marriage, Nick Cooper (Jack Jones) returns to England looking for a comeback. His fickle manager Webster (David Doyle) is willing to give him another shot and found Nick an old country manor to stay at to sort things out and write his new material in luxury. Unbeknownst to our comeback star, his ex-wife Gail (Holly Palance) also returned to England with the intention of taking expensive valuables from their former penthouse, only to fall victim to a sickle-wielding, shrieking ghoul in a hag's mask and a crocheted shawl. 

As the story progresses, Nick's recording sessions proceed with relative success and he even found the time to score a relationship with Webster's adorable secretary Linda (Pamela Stephenson), though his nights are haunted by the echoing sounds of a girl sobbing down the estate's darkened hallways, which progresses to demented cackling and visions of decomposing corpses as the days go by. All of this while Gail's corpse continues to decompose back at the penthouse and more of Nick's old friends start getting bumped off by the same assailant in the hag mask. This leads us to multiple red herrings that may or may not tie in to our singer's seemingly paranormal night terrors and the vicious mad slasher attacks, from Nick’s contact and friend Harry who verbally harasses Pamela by venomously commenting on her breasts when he found the time to be alone with her, to the old caretakers staying at the same estate to help around only to break down behind Nick's back, to Webster with his apparent dislike for girls and implied closet-crossdresser lifestyle of eye shadows and lipstick.

It's hammy and exploitive, much like many of Pete Walker's works, though it is noticeable that there's a length of restraint put to The Comeback (1978), giving room to establish a workable brooding atmosphere, gothic scares, and, too, an intriguing direction to the mystery in regards to what is happening to Jack Jone's character, how all of the madness and murder onscreen will somehow tie in to one another in the end. It is this angle that I find very enjoyable from this movie as the attempt on a serious psychological thriller plot mostly hits the right spot with a developing casts and story, peppered with shockingly brutal murders, gruesome imageries of maggot infested corpses, and a stellar line of casts toplined by Love Boat singer Jack Jones, who I am sure baffled and horrified his fans back in those days for starring in such a gruesome flick!   

The pace can be on the slow side and uneven at times but Walker does an interesting job in managing the horror elements with a lot of build-up and suspense, and, though the bodycount is rather lacking in high numbers, there's a genuine shock value to the murders for how swift and savage they are, implemented greatly with wild editing and a copious amount of onscreen blood. In the end, we get a fair twist and motive behind the killings after a mental institution got involved and another one of Nick's acquaintances disappears, something that I find leaning forward to feisty feta for how cheesy and overly complicated this killer's revenge plan was. But I got a good laugh out of it and I stupidly grinned at the hamminess of it all, so it's not a complete loss in my book! Elevated it actually, to be frank!

A decent treat for slasher fans who wouldn't mind a bit more dimension in their bodycounter stories, The Comeback (1978) is far from perfect, pedestrian as some people would say, yet it's far from awful. Effective and enjoyable for its honest chills, modest thrills and promised spills, it's an unsung cult gem that delivers. Color me impressed!

Bodycount: 

1 female hacked to death with a sickle

1 female corpse seen
1 male stabbed repeatedly with a knife
1 female hacked on the chest with an axe
Total: 4

Loud Witching Hour: Scream Dream (1989)

Scream Dream (1989)
Rating: **1/2

Starring: Carol Carr, Melissa Moore and Nikki Riggins

Ah, yes, cult classic director Donald Farmer. Cannibal Hookers (1987). Deadly Memories (2002). Chainsaw Cheerleaders (2008). Clearly a man with so much taste for cheese, I'm sure he's part mozzarella. In this post, we'll be observing one of his early feature films released around the time of the late 80s shot-on-video boom, a curious tale of witchy macabre, hand puppet demons and big, loud hairstyles!

After an opening credit roll featuring a random sleeping beauty getting attacked by otherworldly arms and a chainsaw slicing out of her bed (and headed towards her crotch), we're treated with a scene following a yuppie metalhead and his bitterly vocal girlfriend making their way to a live show of Satanic rocker Michelle Shock. The nerdy-looking superfan eventually gets the chance to meet the dark temptress backstage, much to the dismay and disgust of his partner who leaves the venue after a lover's quarrel. Michelle, in turn, decides to give the dude a little treat down there for his troubles, only to cut the session short when a certain male member ended up between her teeth in not the nicest way.

Turns out Michelle Shock's Satanist shtick is more than just an act and she's really practicing the dark arts, so much so that her foul-mouthed manager Lou, tired of the constant harassment of journalists hounding him about Shock's shocking lyrical themes and the mysterious disappearances during her shows, fires her from her her own band. This, unsurprisingly, doesn't sit too well with Michelle.

Lou, not wanting to refund any of the money for the remaining shows, hires attractive replacement singer Jamie Summers and sends mullet-branding back-up Derrick to Michelle's to pick up a stage costume. As you would expect, the plan goes South real deep when the former band lead attacks Derrick with a dagger, which mullet boy responds by knocking her out. And then chopping her up with a battle axe. And then stabbing a possessed severed hand with a knife. And then fleeing the scene. 

(Well, that escalated quickly and unnecessarily)

Anywho, the shows go on and Michelle's sudden departure and replacement mostly didn't go unnoticed, especially with the nosy reporters who see this as damage control over the controversies she made. Still, Jamie hopes she would make it big in the heavy metal business, so she drives to Michelle's house to borrow some gear and inevitably finds the former lead dead and apparently appetizing enough to try biting a chunk out of. (Because why the hell not?) Derrick, tailing Jamie in hopes of stopping her from seeing the body, arrives no soon after and convinces her not to call the police. (Because, again, why the hell not?) 

From that point, though, Jamie starts to act weird. And deadly. And I'm sure as fuck the demonic monster she turns into, the drooling mini-rat beast tailing her to get a nibble or two out of people, and the fact she can now raise the dead to kill people for her all have something to do with Michelle's wicked pacts with Satan.

A technical marvel, Scream Dream (1989) is not. Not with its uneven lighting, outdated editing and terrible audio quality that made a few scenes indecipherable over the loud band music, factors that do little help with its wide acting range that falls between mediocre to oh-dear-god-just-stop! These are, however, things one can always expect from a shot-on-video production and I will say that despite all of this mess, the film is at least unintentionally hilarious for its multitudes of insane scenes and trashy moments, even sporting some gnarly violence and mostly impressive looking make-up effects for a low-budget film. With a lean 69 minute running time, padded with three full length metal songs being played in venues and one simple yet crazy plot overblown with cheese, the whole affair is just so bad, it's earnest, enthusiastically fun, given you dive into it with low expectations and a high tolerance for heavy metal horror ham! 

Bodycount:
1 female gets a chainsaw between her legs
1 male had his groin bitten off

1 male stabbed to death with a dagger, disemboweled

1 female hacked with a battle axe

1 male had his scalp clawed, throat cut with a dagger

1 female had her throat ravaged by a demon

1 male had his face ripped off

1 female strangled to death

1 female killed offcamera by a zombie

1 female had her face clawed

1 female stabbed with a dagger

1 male had his groin attacked by a demon

Total: 11

Sacrilege Slaughter Sounds: Death To Metal (2019)

Death To Metal (2019)
Rating: **1/2

Starring: Alex Stein, Grace Melon and Andrew Jessop

I guess you could say that despite not being a complete fan of the music genre, I'm at least tolerant towards heavy metal, even having my share of fave metal bands both real and fictional. (Hello, Lordi. Hello, JP Ahonen's Belzebubs.) As for Rocksploitation slashers, though, I'm a tad more finnicky; aside from a selective few faves of mine like Rocktober Blood (1984) and Hard Rock Nightmare (1988), a good lot of these Heavy Metal massacres like Terror on Tour (1980), The Choke (2006) and Deadtime (2012) just doesn't cut right for me, may it be due to the lack of likable characters, interesting kills and/or overall quality of the direction and story.   

Death To Metal (2019) is another contender for the Rock and Roll hack'n slash gig, more or less promising your typical round of head bangers getting sliced and dicked with a kinda intriguing twist that it doubles as a religious horror flick. Heavy metal clashing against Bible-thumping, what can go wrong?

The film opens with throat growling vocals playing while a trio of metal heads corner and harass a young Catholic boy named Milton by forcing him to watch his precious Bible get pissed on. Forward ahead to the present and we see Milton have grown up into a hateful priest with a short temper and a Fire-and-Brimstone outlook towards his religion, a fact that rightfully concerns his church's head priest into suspending Milton from churchly duties until he seeks professional psychological help.

Feeling betrayed, Milton goes on an alcoholic bender wherein he proceeds to break into the head priest's office to trash it, murder an unfortunate janitor who catches him and tops it all off with a high speed car crash that ends with him lying heavily wounded in a creek. Unbeknownst to our vitriol-spewing Bible-thumper, the creek also happens to be the dumping site of some highly toxic animal feed that, according to the litterbugs, made "hulked-out hogs".

Now deformed, mutated with super strength and gone completely nuts, a more monstrous Milton murders his way to a big metal show where a down-in-his-luck former band lead Zane and his normie bestie Mariah will witness the priest's savage cleansing of all things he deems unworthy of God's love and glory, one sliced up body at a time. 

Going about the messy slasher bits of Death to Metal (2019), I would say it's serviceable enough; the story is easy to follow and the idea of the villain being this very angry priest undergoing an extreme mutation to become even more of a monster fully embraces the silliness of the plot and I love the movie for it. Andrew Jessop is just awesome as Milton Kilborn, with a scowl meaning business and line deliveries that genuinely reflect his character's mental and emotional state as a holy man who gave up on forgiving sinners and fully dedicated his life to the Old Testament style of brutality as divine intervention. Heck, one scene have him reacting to a story about a man brutally murdering his cheating wife by simply pointing out that adultery is a grave offense in the Bible, overlooking the fact that multiple murders were committed. Chilling, indeed.

On the other side of the maniac coin, Monster Milton, played by Trent Johnson, took on a fairly simplistic look of a lumpy, cancer-filled monstrosity hidden underneath a hooded cloak, wielding a wooden cross as his main weapon. Can't say I'm a big fan of the design, especially when I cannot even get a good look at most of the make-up effects done for this aberration, but so long as the gross mutant juggernaut is still spewing judgmental holiness and dishing out a gnarly kill or two, I can dig it on a level. 

And speaking of kills, not gonna lie that despite the large count, a lot of the murders hardly stood out (offscreen kills, ugh), but when they do dip into the gory stuff, they do deliver from nasty bisections to fetuses being ripped out from wombs. Sadly, the rest of the movie certainly felt lacking; for one, a deal of the acting here felt stiff, especially when it comes to our two leads Alex Stein and Grace Melon as Zane and Mariah respectively, which is a darn shame as their characters were written quite nicely, adorably relatable even. For a supposed horror-comedy, the jokes mostly fall flat due to dull delivery and lack of substance and/or solid punchline to back it up, odd considering how chaotic metal music is, you would think there would be more than a punch of energy here. Some scenes also dragged a little longer than it needed to be, hobbling the momentum of the story especially around the middle act, yet regardless of these flaws, I genuinely still find Death To Metal (2019) an admirable stab at Rocksploitation bodycounting done within a low-budget production. 

Keeping it freaky fun with good gore, approachable characters and even a few warm messages about heavy metal music and religion (This is the last film I expected to have a genuinely sincere discussion about religion being about compassion and forgiveness, not hellfire and punishment, but here it is!), Death to Metal (2019) a silly B-flick that's made to be entertaining and I say it done enough to be a good time! Aimed for fans of heavy metal and cheesy bad horror movies, what else is there to say but rock on, little slasher!

Bodycount:

1 female gutted with a knife (flashback animation)

1 male found mutilated (flashback animation)

1 male strangled, later seen impaled through the jaw with a mop handle

1 male sliced in half with a wooden crucifix

1 male had his throat cut with a knife

1 female murdered offcamera, later seen knifed in the chest

1 male had his neck snapped

1 male had his leg broken, force fed with bleach

1 male strangled to death

5 males slaughtered offcamera

1 male stabbed with a wooden crucifix

1 female stabbed in the ears with broken drumsticks

1 female had had her unborn fetus torn out from her gut

1 male stabbed in the chest with broken beer bottles

1 male gets a thrown cymbal to the chest

1 male dragged away, killed

1 male dragged away, killed

1 male dragged away, killed

1 male dragged away, killed

1 male dragged away, killed

1 male dragged away, killed

1 female dragged away, killed

1 male dragged away, killed

1 female found dying in the killer's hold

16 victims seen murdered in a piled

2 males slaughtered inside a van, blood and gore seen splashed around

1 male had his eyes thumbed  

1 male stabbed in the chest with a wooden crucifix

Total: 48

Stick A Pin In An Understudy's Eye: Opera (1987)

Opera (Italy, 1987) (AKA "Terror At The Opera")

Rating: ***

Starring: Cristina Marsillach, Ian Charleson, Urbano Barberini

In a way, I understand the cult following this late-80s Dario Argento giallo made for itself as the film is a mad masterpiece visually, but this isn't to say I don't have my set of reservations about it.

Taking cues from Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of The Opera, the film sets off when the leading lady of a production of Macbeth gets into a car accident after ranting about the opera's experimental direction. (Apparently she's not a fan of ravens. Or laser beams) This leads to a young understudy, Betty (Christina Marsillach), to step into the role, something she's not entirely thrilled about as she sees this as an omen of terrible things to come. The Macbeth curse, if you may.

And surely enough, as Betty sings her part that night, we see a gloved individual sneak into one of the closed-off opera boxes to get a better view of the show and we know this creeper is up to no good when they start to reminisce about that one time they attacked a woman while another was bound and forced to watch. Their little impromptu private viewing gets interrupted, however, when a staff finds them, leading to the gloved fella to brain the man dead against a coat hook, their struggle causing a set of stage lights to go hurling down.

Despite this fiasco, the show is a somewhat success, much to Betty's and the rest of the production team's delight, though the incident with the lights did lead to the police and an attending inspector to investigate and find the murdered staff. Freaked out by this, the young starlet chooses to cool off by hanging out with her stagehand boyfriend and make love with him at his apartment later that evening, only for it all end with Betty getting tied to a pillar and have pins placed under her eyes by the gloved and now-hooded prowler, forcing her to watch them brutally dispatch her lover before simply cutting her loose and exiting the scene.

In shock, Betty wanders off into the rainy night and gets picked up by the production's director, Marco (Ian Charleson), who happens to be driving by. As she confides with him of what just happened, Betty also vaguely recalls a nearly-forgotten childhood memory of the same hooded killer murdering her mother some time ago, which may mean that the killer knows her and it won't be long before they target her once again, killing anyone who gets in the way.

By the 1980s, a decent lot of Italian giallo films start to resemble less like crime pulp fiction as much of their focus swayed more on keeping up the splatter and kill count high, a response towards the rising popularity of American slashers around that decade. This is evident in Opera (1987)'s vividly bloody murder set-pieces, which is undoubtedly among director Dario Argento's most memorable contributions to giallo horror for their nightmarish nature and strikingly creative execution. While not overly gory, the bloodletting is generous and the attacks are simply ferocious, done with the key extravagance of a creative eye only the likes of Argento possess as his signature visuals of color tints and expressive camera work make their way into brutal close-ups of a stabbed jaw, or an amazing gun murder involving a slow-mo shot of a bullet going through a door's peephole, through an unfortunate victim's head, and finally to a nearby phone, destroying it.  

What doesn't work, however, is the overall quality of the film's mystery; with the way the plot flows through its run, Opera (1987) indefinitely shows little care about the suggested whodunits as there are hardly any police presence and very little of the characters introduced got any further development than a single (and often strange) note. (Though, I got to say I love the fact that we never saw the original leading lady's face. Makes me chuckle for reasons) This meant that our killer could have been anyone among the crowd, which cheapens the story halfway into an exploitative slasher flick, all the way down to its ridiculous climax of using vengeful ravens to out the killer, as well as the mountain of mad ramblings and expositions in an attempt to piece things together and look smart or dramatic. 

I'm also not a big fan of some of the murders being clashed with heavy metal for what I take is symbolic chaos. It's too obnoxiously on-the-nose and it just doesn't work for me, but even that's vanilla compared to my biggest gripe about the movie; you see, Opera (1987) could have ended in, well, the opera, as Betty is forced at gunpoint by the killer to enter a room filled with paperwork. The killer ties her up, locks the room and douses everything in gasoline, intent on ending both of their lives in what's best described as a lovelorn murder/suicide. A fire broke, an intense escape happens and then we're suddenly in the alps. The fucking alps. Weeks later. Without spoiling much, we have ten to fifteen minutes to spare (depending on which release you got), the killer is still out there and then we're treated to one of the most convenient endings I've seen in a giallo, ruining whatever gruesomely gothic atmosphere this movie had before we're in the fucking alps.

Opera (1987) is as standard as any late 80s bodycounter is and I'm willing to accept it as a flawed cult classic seeing all the best things about it is undeniably enjoyable. What it lacks in intrigue and a satisfying ending, it makes up with an eloquent aesthetic and carnal display of brutality and madness. See it if you like and maybe you'll enjoy it enough to compel somebody else to see it, hopefully without taping pins under their eyes...  

Bodycount:

1 male repeatedly beaten against a coat hook

1 female killed, method unknown (flashback)

1 female killed with a dagger (flashback)

1 male gets a dagger through the throat, stabbed to death

1 female strangled, stabbed in the chest with a pair of dressmaker shears

1 female shot through the head

1 male found knifed in the gut

1 female mentioned strangled

1 female shot

1 female found knifed on the chest

1 male knifed to death

Total: 10

Eulogy For Euphoria: Sound of Violence (2021)

Sound of Violence (USA/Finland, 2021)

Rating: ***1/2

Starring: Jasmin Savoy Brown, Lili Simmons, James Jagger

Remember back in 2013 when Canada introduced to us Discopathe? That trippy slasher movie where a guy is somehow triggered into mad serial killings whenever he hears disco music? Well, this Finnish-American production explores a similar aspect of musical madness, albeit on a more psychodrama approach with a small taste of exploitative murders ala SAW sequel-inspired machinations and sonic-based body horror. 

The scene begins in 2002, as we watch ten-year old deaf girl Alexis finds her PTSD-suffering, Vietnam vet father in the middle of butchering her mother and brother with a meat cleaver. She strikes him dead with a vengeful swing of a meat tenderizer, an act that not only miraculously restores her hearing, but also makes her experience a euphoric sensation unlike any other.

Now as an adult, Alexis works as a music teacher’s aide and is deeply interested (or, rather, obsessed) with experimental music. She hides her past well enough, though she still longs for that same sensation she felt during the night she murdered her father and, with her deafness apparently making a haunting comeback, Alexis sees herself growing desperate to replicate that high. She soon piece things together that the sound of pain is what sparked both her hearing and the otherworldly euphoria, thus setting her plan to explore the joy of pain-based music and create an orchestral masterpiece out of the suffering of others. 

Less of your typical paint-by-number bodycounter and closer to a descent-to-madness character study, Sound of Violence (2021) tackles the meaty subjects of re-occurring childhood trauma and creative addiction behind the sympathetic eyes of a troubled individual slowly being consumed by her commitment to an unexplainable elation. It is an idea that's handled in a manner that gives our main character an intriguingly solid motivation and, with the source of her needed jubilation stemming from torture and death, this ingeniously gives the film ways to ensure the finesse of the narrative doesn't overshadow the horror-tainted entertainment value of the film.

Working well with this approach is Jasmin Savoy Brown's performance as our disturbed yet inspired murderous musician Alexis Reeves, giving the role a sense of normalcy at first rather than overworking the brooding psychopathy head on. This hands us a window to look into and understand the situation our soon-to-be killer finds herself in and what she's going through because of it, as everything she built for herself gets threatened to be taken away by fate unless she does something drastic about it. This, of course, does not excuse her for the murders, but we see her plight and genuine remorse after each deed done, thus we couldn't completely paint her as a monster but, instead, as someone who is sincerely losing control of herself and is willing to do the extreme to keep whatever good left she sees in her life.

Said extremes are the horror aspects of the plot, wherein Alexis pushes the boundaries of her mental stability, as well as the warm living flesh of her victims, just to feel a sensation of color and lights that's never really explained. People, in turn, gets kidnapped, tricked and/or drugged into participating in her symphony of pain and torment, resulting to outlandish deaths and murder scenarios including a chair rigged with moving knives and hammers that syncs up to a synthesizer keyboard and a plot involving drugging a harpist into playing a harp with razor-thin strings. At times, the extravagance of these murder scenes clashes with the implied seriousness and drama of the story (wait til' you see the beach finale. The cheese levels were a little high there), but it does help put Sound of Violence (2021) on a more memorable light as a horror feature and it doesn't stray away too much from the tone of the movie.

If there will be anything I could nitpick about this film is that the fact it felt lacking on some parts introduced, like the police procedural that's more of a red herring than an actual plot point with how little time we get to spend with these scenes and how flat they are whenever we do get them. I do get much of the focus is supposed to be through Alexis' perspective, but these procedurals have enough appearances to warrant some form of conflict, but alas they're just there to imply somebody is aware of the bloody mess our killer's leaving behind and that's it.

Still, I see a lot of potential from this movie to be a B-flick favorite for those who love their horror weird. It's undeniably posh on some parts, but it has enough madness and bloodshed to satisfy a horror hound's craving for a modern psychodrama!

Bodycount:

1 female and 1 boy found hacked to death with a meat cleaver

1 male brained with a meat tenderizer

1 male hit by an incoming car (flashback)

1 male stabbed and beaten to death in a weaponized chair 

1 male had his head cooked with electric shocks through theremin-rigged electrodes, explodes

1 male bludgeoned to death with a sledgehammer

1 female had speakers ran through her body via impromptu surgery, dies from her wounds 

Total: 7 

Welp, it's officially December 25 in my country

Ladies and Gentlemen, Twisted Sister!

 Happy holidays, everybody! Have a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Krampusnacht and/or whatever traditional Winter holiday you all celebrate!

TAKE CARE AND BE GOOD PEOPLE!

Dearest Bitch, See How Accessible You Are?: The Fan (1981)

The Fan (1981)
Rating: ***
Starring: Lauren Bacall, James Garner, Michael Biehn

Just a while ago, I saw this movie revolving around an obsessed fan who goes cuckoo and stalky after not getting something he wants from a star he dangerously admires. It was sucky, stupid and a total waste of my time and money, The Fanatic (2019) downed itself with John Travolta in his worst role to date and a story so narking than scary, it's nauseating to stomach. Thankfully, I got The Fan (1981) to cleanse the sour sludge off my palate: far from a masterpiece, yet watchable for its confused dramatics and alright slasher-esque thrills.

Douglas Breen (Michael Biehn) is our titular obsessive fanatic, fallen head over heels for an aging broadway star Sally Ross (Lauren Bacall) and spends most of his free time away from working at a record store typing fan letters and having imaginary dates with Ross. One reply, however, puts him in a sour mood after being referred to as a "fan" since Breen sees himself better than a regular admirer. This sparks a downward spiral to his emotional psyche, stalking Ross to her upcoming musical stage play and proceeds to leave increasingly threatening love letters while slicing the star's friends and associates with a straight razor.

At times, The Fan (1981) works its way as a character-driven drama thriller quite well. As self-centered and short-tempered she is, our Sally Ross is a rather complicated gal with bouts of loneliness and insecurities behind her strong and brave face as she constantly seeks reassurance. Bacall conveys these characters rather beautifully on screen, including one bittersweet banter between Ross' on-and-off romance played by James Garner wherein she questions her ex-hubby about her ability to sing and dance, pondering if she's well enough to pull off another show. Her musical numbers do need some work to make it anymore worth past the cheese and cringe but, overall, she is one of the good things to come out of this movie. The other would be Michael Biehn.

Playing our villain, Biehn had the opportunity to make his fan-turned-stalker role far from the norm and he tried. Acting-wise, he doesn't have a lot of dialogue seeing most of his thoughts are played as voice-overs but he's still able to play out the maddened menace his character is slowly becoming through a lot of body language and vocal tone. It's terrifying at times, pitiable even knowing this incomprehensible obsession and violent streaks was simply caused by a simple fan letter, but not a lot of this fanaticism is properly explored and it left us with a shallow villain and a bunch of missed opportunities to dive deeper into his psychosis and fascination for the old actress, losing a bit of that sympathy card to make our villain as engaging or understandable as our lead.

Sleaze and violence is near absent in The Fan (1981), atypical to most slasher films being released around its time though not a lot of them did try to piece together soap-style drama and character study with exploitative hack-and-slash. While the story engages in very little kill count, the stalking set-pieces has their memorable moments including one indoor swimming pool attack that left one of Sally's colleagues' belly sliced open whilst doing some strokes and a quick yet passable train station stalking reminiscent of the subway scene from De Palma's Dressed To Kill (1981). The climactic crossing between Ross and Breen could have been longer, but it interestingly fits in tone and even gets genuinely intense during some of the attacks.

Half-and-half camp and class, The Fan (1981) is nowhere near a great piece of cinema, but it has enough engaging elements to be still entertaining. Recommended for fans of trashy melodramas, as well as patient slasher fans with a taste for the odd.

Bodycount:
1 female slashed with a razor
1 male had his throat slashed with a razor, set ablaze
1 female stabbed on the gut with a switchblade
1 male stabbed on the gut with a switchblade
1 male stabbed on the throat with a switchblade
Total: 5

Choking Hazard: The Choke (2006)

The Choke (2006) (AKA "Axe")
Rating: *1/2
Starring: Damon Abdallah, Brooke Bailey, Sean Cook

Rock music and slasher films. Occasionally paired together. Rarely works.

I've seen my fair share of rock-themed bodycounters and, so far, I only enjoyed a few cheesy titles like Hard Rock Nightmare (1989), Rocktober Blood (1984) and the "half-slasher" Trick or Treat (1986). Perhaps it's my taste for music and/or culture getting in the way, or perhaps most of the stories they come up with regarding rock stars meeting Friday the 13th-style deaths aren't entertaining enough for me, whatever it is keeping me from fully embracing rock culture hack'n slash, it has nothing to do with the mediocre feelings I have for The Choke.

Or does it?

In this rocksploitation little number, a band called The Choke is playing at a nightclub, with most of its members unaware that this is their final gig as their lead singer and guitarist are planning to go solo afterwards, more or less splitting the group up. This drama, however, will play second bananas in terms of big issues as, due to the club owner's sudden lack of alcohol to serve (...how?), the band and their little groupies find themselves abandoned inside the club, locked in with who appears to be a deranged killer wandering around, hacking people to death with musical instruments.

On one note, I wanted The Choke to work. As mentioned prior, I don't usually enjoy rocksploitation as much as the next guy does but I do wish to break this streak once in a while and The Choke has somewhat of a potential to be at least "cheesy bad" given the terrible scripting and sloth-pace formulaic direction were paid off with a serviceable amount of gore and interesting characters.

But nope. Instead, our thespians hardly emote and come out more annoying and dull, and the ways they meet their maker were only half-way workable. "Only halfway" because while I do like the splashy and gooey gore, the build-up to the kills were mediocre at worst, The story's also near non-existent, tortuously padded with a lot of walking scenes and frustrating attempts to build some traits out of the paper-thin casts. I guess they were working up the tension and red herrings to make the supposed shock reveal in the end as effective as the low budget can afford it, but it wasn't really that interesting nor creative. Did we saw it coming? Maybe not. But with the way this film was handled, I really doubt I would care either ways.

So with the only good to come out of this film being the little snippets of practical gore and its few laughable moments of stupidity, The Choke choked as a slasher and perhaps sets rock'n roll horror back a few months. Can't recommend it unless you made it your mission to see every single slashers ever made. Should that be the case, then may the gods be with you, you magnificent bastard.

Bodycount:
1 male powerdrilled through  the chest
1 female found disemboweled
1 female hacked in half with a studded bass guitar
1 male found castrated and choked on a severed groin
1 male repeatedly hacked with a cymbal stand, stabbed on the eye with a drumstick
1male impaled on steel rods
1 male hacked to death with an axe
Total: 7

Dance The Obvious Dance: Dance Macabre (1992)

Dance Macabre (US/Russia, 1992)

Rating: *1/2

Starring: Robert Englund, Michelle Zeitlin, Marianna Moen

In this rarity of a 90s thriller, a prestigious Russian dance academy opens its doors for the first time to non-Russian students, including one Jessica Anderson, an American who's forced into attending by her wealthy father. 

Overlooking the arrivals is the handicapped headmistress Madame Gordenko, who is aided by her two companions, dance instructors Anthony Wager and Olga. The madame instantly becomes a challenge for Jessica as her strict lessons clash with the young American's easy-going attitude. Nevertheless, Jessica finds encouragement from a few friendly faces, including her French roommate Claudine, a photographer named Alex, and Anthony himself, who agrees to help her via private lessons as he sees a little bit of the young Gordenko in the girl.

While Jessica perfects her ballet, a gloved killer is making their way through the other students, seemingly picking off girls with potential for dancing. Could it be someone with a motive? Or just a random loon being a little too knife-happy?

To be honest, around two to four minutes into the movie, you can tell the major twists here unless the copy saw was that bad or you are that easily fooled. (no offense) I actually find myself wondering how exactly did the producers thought they could get away with it but if I am going to be brutally truthful, they hardly tried. So did this quirk somehow messed up the overall entertainment value of the movie?

At some point, yes. The plot is an easy one to follow as it is formulaic; anybody that appears to do better in dancing than Jessica gets bumped off dead no soon after and the school doesn't take notice until the disappearances and murders got too frequent. And with only three to four possible suspects to go around, the way they were portrayed made guessing who's the killer and who are the red herrings a little too obvious when two of them got snuffed off too soon and, again, the obvious twist is right there in front of our faces.

With a weak whodunit plot and an embarrassingly obvious twist, all Dance Macabre did for me was made me think how much longer before the characters are gonna catch up and, once more, how exactly did the people behind this movie thought they could fool anyone with their little gimmick? As a slasher-esque thriller, it's also not that bloody or suspenseful in any way since most of the killings were tame and the build-up to them were mediocre at best. However, I can't seem to hate this movie as much as I want to since its cheese factor did got me smirking and the Suspiria (and Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho) inspired story almost worked if it wasn't for the shortcomings.

Originally, Dance Macabre was Terror in Manhattan, a proposed 90s sequel to the underrated period slasher Phantom of The Opera (1989) which also explains the "instructor obsessing over student" angle this movie's partially riding on. After various re-writes, Terror becomes this hodge podge ham-fest riddled with artsy dance montages, an uninspired mystery and a lot of bland characters, with the only relative connection to Phantom was that they both star Robert "Freddy Krueger" Englund. Perhaps with more time given to the re-writes, as well as better killings and a much more passable twist, Dance Macabre could have been a rarity worth looking for. But alas, unless you are a big Englund fan like me, I suggest giving this one a skip like what I should have done many moons ago.

Bodycount:
1 female drowned in a jacuzzi
1 female hanged 

1 female beaten, thrown to train tracks and ran over by a train

1 female bludgeoned with a cane, thrown off a window
1 male stabbed on the gut with a dagger
1 female falls on a dagger
1 female killed in bike crash (flashback)
1 male falls off from a balcony, impaled on broken chairs
Total: 8

Double the Mayhem, Double the Cheese: Wicked, Wicked (1973)

Wicked, Wicked (1973)
Rating: ***
Starring: David Bailey, Tiffany Bolling, Randolph Roberts

Welcome to the Grandview hotel! One of California's finer beachside establishments with good food, good music, good lounging and... a killer wearing an over-sized monster mask ?!

It appears someone is lingering all over the hotel, stalking and murdering women before sneaking their bodies away to God-knows-where, leading to most of the hotel's staffs believing that these women just sneaked away without ever paying their bills. However, the hotel's guard-slash-former detective Rick Stewart doesn't buy this and believes something else might be at play here.

He decided to look further into this, much to the disapproval of his colleagues who fear his snooping might give the hotel a bad reputation, but when Stewart's ex-wife-slash- lounge singer Lisa James decided to show up and perform at the hotel, Rick is determined to find the maniac before they strike again...or at least before they see the former-missus dons a blonde wig!

As much as I want to describe my experience with Wicked, Wicked as simple as "weird", this proto-slasher actually won me over with its tongue-in-cheek undertone and, as gimmicky as it is, the utilized split-screen format, marketed here as "Duo-Vision".

It did take me a bit to get used to the two-screen storytelling, but once I adjusted to the cheesy gimmick, I found myself captivated and slightly-impressed on how they put it to use, giving us dual perspectives of some single scenes as well as utilizing it for flashbacks, reveals, and even a few details that fleshed out some of our likely suspects, without the need of halting the main story. It's silly, yes, but it helps in the very little way it can in making something out of the tepid story, which is already being boosted up as an entertainment piece by its high dose of camp and some worthwhile musical undertones. If anything, the movie appears to be poking fun at itself as a rather carefree and bodycount-friendly take on a psycho-thriller, a film entertainingly dumb enough to go well with hot buttered popcorn and switched-off brains.

This being said, Wicked, Wicked isn't going to be a movie for anybody expecting a well-written and well-executed horror flick as, for one, it wasted a potential murder mystery angle by revealing the killer way too early, leaving a good dose of the remaining run focusing on our leads figuring what we already know. The only real mystery left at that point is "why" the killer's committing the murders, but if one would focus on the split screen flashbacks, that department's pretty standard on my book as well.

Due to this, mighty good portions of the movie goes through a lot of fillers answering questions one could have already figured out by then, unnecessarily and unevenly slowing the film down. Fortunately, after so many cop-and-killer shenanigans that includes dirty pipes and hidden rooms, Wicked, Wicked manages to get back on its feet once the killer's little secrets are discovered by our hapless heroes, revealing what he does to the bodies that rings familiarity with later slasher flicks such as The Horrible House on the Hill (1974), The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and Pieces (1982), and soon wrapping up rather cheekily with a hilarious villain demise and a meta-joke that sounds awfully like what the gravedigger spat out at Friday the 13th Part 6: Jason Lives.

All-in-all, I think Wicked, Wicked is a flawed treat, a new little guilty pleasure I can heartily enjoy only if there's nothing else to see. It ain't that great to be wholefully recommended but it wouldn't hurt to give it a peek if it's on TV.

Bodycount:
1 female repeatedly knifed on the gut
1 female repeatedly knifed on the gut
1 female repeatedly knifed on the gut
1 male shot death (flashback)
1 male brained with a fire poker (flashback)
1 female knifed on the gut
1 female decapitated with a guillotine
2 females found dismembered and sewn back
1 male falls and lands on a spiked fence
Total: 10

Heavy Metal Full Moon: Hard Rock Nightmare (1988)

Hard Rock Nightmare (1988)

Rating: ***

Starring: Greg Joujon-Roche, Annie Mikan, Lisa Elaina 

Surely, there are bound to be other werewolf slashers out there save for the film adaptation of Stephen King's Silver Bullet, right? Other movies to feature a big hairy lupine monster stalking and killing victims in the most slasher influenced way? Why, of course! And here is one of them: a monster-in-the-backwoods rarity known as Hard Rock Nightmare!

Some time ago, young Jimmy was terrorized by his grampa who claims to be a vampire and a werewolf. (A "werewumpire", if I may) Unfortunately for the old geezer, Jim took all of this seriously and hammers a stake down at grampa's heart, much to the tyke and his gramma's horror.

This mistake traumatized Jim for life, but he manages himself by starting a band called "The Bad Boys" with his big-haired friends and big-haired girlfriend. All was good until one jamming session got them in hot water with the local cops for playing their music too loud. Not wanting to get into more trouble, one of them suggests that they visit Jim's late grampa's home for a weekend of fun and rock'n roll, a plan that got our hero a little uneasy but agrees to anyway as he sees this as an opportunity to fight off his trauma.

One dream about his friends being zombies later, Jim and his buds make it to the house, rehearsing and sleeping with the girls as they planned, only to have one of them lose his noggin from an apparent werewolf attack. Perhaps the old coot's crazy talk of being Grampa Munster wasn't crazy afterall!

From that point on, Hard Rock Nightmare tackles down all known slasher movie trite such as people leaving the group and splitting up to find help (inevitably falling prey to the werewolf's claws), POV shots of the monster heavy-breathing, and a few stereotyped characters getting their just desserts, just to name a few overused ones.

But for a film to end up this obscure, I would say the reason for this is Hard Rock Nightmare's barely bloody and can be repetitive with its killings as a monster/slasher hybrid, something that may not sit well with the fact that the horror action also takes a while to start. Thankfully, I still found some strengths from it to even out the flaws, like how the movie is done away with a fair amount of cheese and a slightly comedic tone that it can be distracting enough to be hilarious, passing the running time with loads of laughably bad performances that went sorta well with the silly situation, fever dreams, and the over-the-top twist reveal that felt more fitting with a Saturday morning cartoon, but doltish enough to be acceptable. It also helps that the the songs featured here are pretty good, particularly the number the band played during the opening.

As a horror flick, Hard Rock Nightmare fails to be terrifying despite the attempted monster and slasher movie scares but it makes up quite a lot with its tongue-in-cheek scripting and campiness. It's as straightforward as it can with its approach and lovers of horror of the cheddar kind can definitely find something to appreciate from this gem as one of the few epitomes of an entertaining popcorn flick! See it if you can coz it is worth the hunt!

Bodycount:
1 male gets a stake hammered through his heart
1 male had his head clawed off
1 female mauled to death
1 male mauled to death
1 male mauled offcamera
1 male dies from mauling
1 female doused in gasoline, set ablaze
1 male shot to death
1 male shot
Total: 9