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It’s a curious sensation when cheap, willfully base trash attains a sense of real poignancy. Who could have known back when Arrow Video first announced this mighty Herschell Gordon Lewis box set back in the summer that the man himself would not live to see its release? Still, as sad as Lewis’s recent death was, it was a pleasant surprise to see that it did not go unmarked by the broader reaches of the mainstream media. After all, in his own way Lewis was one of the most significant figures in late 20th century cinema, as the first filmmaker to bring full-on graphic gore to the screen. And it wasn’t just the red stuff that was the revelation; looking back through Lewis’s movies, we can identify motifs that horror has continued to fall back on in the fifty-plus years since. Not that any of this means we can necessarily class Lewis as a ‘great’ filmmaker; indeed, he himself seemed to shun any such labels right to the end, refuting any accusations of artistry and insisting he treated filmmaking purely and simply as a business. And after watching the 14 films in this box-set more or less back to back in fairly rapid succession, I can certainly confirm the vast majority of this is in no danger of being mistaken for high art; but as a snapshot of the type of movies that history would often prefer to brush under the carpet, Lewis’ body of work is certainly an eye-opener.

The opening scene alone from 1963 groundbreaker Blood Feast feels like a blueprint for decades of slasher/splatter movies to come: pretty blonde girl ignores radio report about a killer on the loose, strips down for a bath, and shortly finds herself getting savaged to death by a madman with a knife. The camera slowly pulls away, giving the audience time to take in the sight as she lies dead in the tub, blood gushing from her eye socket, naked body largely exposed. There you have it: gore and tits, in full colour. Hitchcock may have pioneered the hot blonde bathroom murder scene three years earlier, but Lewis wasn’t interested in suggestive editing for psychological impact; instead, he was a pioneer in showing the audience exactly what they came to see. And he was already accustomed to such an approach, having previously directed a handful of the first ‘nudie cuties’ (none of which are included in this set, which may disappoint completists).

Blood Feast remains perhaps Lewis’s definitive work, although the man himself stressed that he regarded his next gore movie, 1964’s 2000 Maniacs!, to be his finest film. There’s a lot to be said for that, as 2000 Maniacs! is a far more ambitious and plot-driven production with a far larger ensemble cast, and again it’s notable for establishing a set-up which would become a genre staple: the backwoods hillbilly horror, in which big city out-of-towners stumble unwittingly into a death trap at the hands of cannibalistic, most likely inbred hicks. It’s certainly his most well-rounded and genuinely witty film, with underlying hints of social commentary which still resonate today. Still, I rather feel that the more simplistic approach of Blood Feast, with its delugue of still quite nauseating blood, guts and brain shots in juicy close-up bridged by goofy scenes loaded with stilted acting and piss-poor storytelling, amounts to a better representation of Lewis overall. And of course, Mal Arnold’s Fuad Ramses – the maniacal caterer gathering the ingredients for his EGYPTIAN FEAST! – is the most memorable Lewis killer.

In any case, the highlights of this set are without question the gore-driven movies. Color Me Blood Red and The Gruesome Twosome both balance lame-brained comedy with occasional moments of outrageous evisceration, whilst his later films push the envelope that bit farther. 1970’s The Wizard of Gore was the first HGL movie I saw, and it definitely feels a cut above the rest thanks to a wonderfully hammy central turn from Ray Sager as the titular magician Montag, the second most iconic Lewis antagonist. 1972’s The Gore Gore Girls – the last film Lewis directed until his 2002 comeback Blood Feast 2 (also omitted here; ditto 2009 follow-up The Uh-Oh Show) – is particularly notable as, beyond that opening scene in Blood Feast, it’s the only HGL film that really combines bloodshed with nudity. Indeed, given their uber-sleazy reputation, it is surprising how mild many of HGL’s films are in terms of sexuality, with sex only ever alluded to and exposed flesh rarely getting further than bathing suit level. Not so The Gore Gore Girls, which as the title might suggest centres on a strip club whose dancers start getting targeted by a vengeful killer whose victims meet increasingly more absurd ends; most notably, one stripper has her bare arse beaten to a pulp with a meat tenderizer (then literally marinaded), whilst another gets the tips of her nipples snipped off with scissors, resulting in a squirt of milk. Eye-openers indeed.

However, beyond the aforementioned six films, the remainder of this 14-film set isn’t really gore-driven at all – and, in all honesty, the other films are of considerably less interest. 1968’s She Devils in Wheels was reportedly the first all-girl biker movie, and as bad girl exploitation goes it’s quite good fun, but not on quite the same level as its predecessor Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, or the Jack Hill bad girl movies that would follow in the 70s. Again, it’s surprisingly mild sexually (the tagline ‘riding their men as viciously as they ride their motorcycles’ doesn’t quite ring true), but it does boast at least one unforgettable gore shot in the final act’s slo-mo decapitation. 1967’s A Taste of Blood is the greatest oddity of the bunch, a surprisingly sober and slow-paced contemporary take on Dracula which is very low on gore and stretches out to almost two hours in length; a misguided attempt on the director’s part to go respectable, I think.

Beyond that, we have the original ‘roughie’ in 1963’s Scum of the Earth, a morality tale about young women unwittingly coerced into posing naked for sleazy photographers (in other words, a thinly veiled excuse to show tits and ass, making it all the more surprising Lewis largely avoided that in his later movies); 1967’s suitably entitled Something Weird, a tale of ESP and witchcraft which is largely forgettable beyond a wonderfully hammy central witch; 1968 teen rebellion movie Just For The Hell Of It, a largely plotless montage of over the top juvenile delinquency; 1968’s How To Make A Doll, something of a forebear to Weird Science in which a nerdy scientist uses a super-computer to create beautiful women (and like Weird Science, it’s not as racy as you’d expect); and a duet of hicksploitation in Moonshine Mountain and This Stuff’ll Kill Ya!, both of which centre on degenerate country folk being all country and degenerate.

There does seem to have been a spot of the old controversy among collectors over the price tag on this limited edition set, currently going for £92.99 on Amazon. Whether it warrants this asking price, I will leave to readers to judge for themselves. The films have no doubt never looked better, and each disc features an abundance of features including many new interviews with Lewis shot in the last months of his life, plus interviews with many of his key collaborators; we also have Frank Henenlotter and Jimmy Maslon’s engaging 2009 documentary Herschell Gordon Lewis: The Godfather of Gore, which gives a good overview of his career.

Still, as this is a set that’s clearly targeting die-hard HGL fans, many may disappointed by the absence of at least some of the other 20-odd films he directed between 1961 and 1972, not to mention the two he made in the 2000s. Speaking for myself, I’ll also admit I’m unlikely to revisit many of these beyond the six core gore movies; God’s honest truth, a lot of these are really pretty dull films. Then again, they were never really designed to be watched attentively at home in a high-definition format; they were simple, undemanding fodder for the drive-ins and grindhouses, largely background viewing for audiences who would invariably find other ways to keep themselves entertained, and this no doubt remains the best way to watch the bulk of these movies. Still, as archaeology has long demonstrated, the line between trash and treasure gets ever blurrier as time passes; and it pays not only to be mindful of the true artistic masterpieces of years gone by, but also the bog standard populist entertainment which, in many respects, tells you more about what the world was really like in those long lost times. As such, The Herschell Gordon Lewis Feast is without doubt an essential purchase for dedicated pop culture historians; for everyone else, we can but hope that Arrow Video see fit to release at least some of these films individually down the line. For now, though, this is a fine tribute to a man who, whether he thought so or not, made a major impact on the art of filmmaking. Yes, I said art.

Arrow Video’s limited edition (2,500 copies) Herschell Gordon Lewis Feast dual format Blu-ray/DVD boxset is available on 24th October, exclusively via Amazon. (The more lavish and even more limited edition Box of Gore (500 copies) is already out of stock at boxofgore.com.)

One of the exciting things about the contemporary indie horror scene is that, as a seemingly increasing number of filmmakers opt to self-distribute their own work, the more prolific among them may put out two or more films per year. A hell of a lot of work for the filmmakers, no doubt, but a tremendous advantage to those who enjoy their work; where in the past fans might say “can’t wait for the next one!” and then be happy to see it show up two years later, today we sometimes barely have to wait at all.

Such is the case with Plank Face, the latest movie from Bandit Motion Pictures, who only about six months ago put out their last feature, and one of my personal favourites of 2016, Harvest Lake. As might be anticipated, there’s plenty of common ground between the two films: both make use of the same woodland locations, sport similarly eerie synthesizer-based scores, feature actress Ellie Church, and boast a whole lot of sex. However, where Harvest Lake went to heavily supernatural places whilst exploring sexuality in a manner which might well leave viewers questioning whether or not it really qualifies as a horror movie, Plank Face leaves no such doubts whatsoever: this is horror with a capital H, a tale of backwoods survival which could comfortably sit on the shelf alongside The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, The Hills Have Eyes and the like. That said, Plank Face is still very far removed from your standard Chainsaw wannabe, and like Harvest Lake before it is determined to challenge preconceptions and leave questions unanswered, forcing the viewer to sit up and pay attention from start to finish.

Also like Harvest Lake before it, Plank Face opens on an anonymous couple getting amorous in the woods before events take a dark turn. From there we meet Max (Nathan Barrett) and his girlfriend Stacey (Ellie Church) as they head out into the woods for a camping trip. Naturally things go south pretty quickly, and following a brutal confrontation with a stranger, Max is cold-cocked by a woman in a bunny mask (Alyss Winkler). When he comes to, Max is half-naked and bound in a cabin with the ‘Bunny Girl’ and two more feral women, one an elder matriarch (Susan M Martin as ‘Granny’), another younger woman for whom he seems intended (Brigid Macauley as ‘The Bride’), and Stacey is nowhere to be seen. Anxious to escape and find her, Max’s efforts to get away don’t turn out well – and soon enough he finds himself with a slab of wood attached to his face, and comes to the gradual realisation that he is being forcibly entered into this highly unorthodox family unit.

Again in common with Harvest Lake, Plank Face isn’t the easiest film to discuss without giving too much away, but it seems at heart to be an exercise in Stockholm syndrome, as much for the audience as the protagonist. The feral women are clearly meant to repulse and horrify us at first, and while their activities don’t necessarily get any less repulsive or horrific as the film progresses, our sense of who they are as characters does develop. This is particularly impressive as, beyond the opening scenes, the film is largely devoid of dialogue; the women have a language of their own, and while in some instance the words have readily apparent meaning (‘eta’ = ‘eat’ being the most readily apparent example), the bulk of it we are left to decipher purely from body language and behaviour. As Max spends more time in this environment, he comes to function on their wavelength – and soon we’re left to question just how much of his old personality is left. Given that Barrett has to convey this transformation with neither dialogue nor his face, it’s a pretty remarkable feat of acting. Nor are his co-stars any less impressive, with particular note being due to Martin as Granny, truly one of the scariest performances I’ve seen this year.

But of course, this isn’t all character-based psychological drama. As previously stated, Plank Face is a full-on horror movie, and that means we have all manner of weird and unpleasant goings-on: rape, cannibalism, torture, and disfigurement are there in abundance, and much of the cast spends the bulk of their screentime fully or partially naked. Clearly this might all be a tad bit intense for the more casual horror viewer, but seasoned genre fans will recognise and appreciate the underlying dark humour that keeps things from getting too nasty.

The second collaboration between Bandit Motion Pictures team Scott Schirmer (director, co-writer, producer, editor) and Brian K Williams (co-writer, producer, cinematographer, and here making an impressive debut on soundtrack duties), Plank Face makes it clear that this partnership works, and is hopefully here to stay; their next, The Bad Man, has already been announced. I don’t know anything about that project, but all I can say is that I hope they don’t go back to the woods for a third time, as there might be a danger of their work feeling just a bit samey. However, as long as they keep making such handsome-looking films which push the parameters of horror whilst still delivering all the lurid thrills we love the genre for, then I’m very eager to see what they do next.

Plank Face is available on limited edition Blu-ray and DVD from Bandit Motion Pictures, and is also available to rent or buy on Amazon Video (UK readers can find it here).

‘Plank Face’ Trailer A from Bandit Motion Pictures on Vimeo.

By Ben Bussey

There’s nothing too out of the ordinary about being left disappointed by a low budget indie horror movie from a largely unknown cast and crew. However, there’s a particularly bitter sting to this sensation when the film in question shows so much promise, and ticks so many of your personal boxes for what should constitute a hugely entertaining horror. The third movie from writer-director Ari Kirschenbaum, Grave Walkers (formerly entitled Live Evil, presumably retitled to avoid confusion with the 2009 movie of the same name and/or the Black Sabbath live album) is a film which, on paper, seems almost custom designed to my tastes: it’s a colourful, supernatural spook-a-blast filled with skull-faced, luminescent-eyed demonic zombies facing off against wisecracking, gun-toting cops, with an extremely groovy soundtrack, and a few gratuitous tit shots thrown in for good measure. All things I appreciate; and at times, it’s enough. Yet by the time the end credits roll, it’s hard not to be thoroughly underwhelmed with the past 90-odd minutes.

It’s Halloween night in small town America, and as ever the sleepy local Sheriff’s department don’t expect too much trouble. Naturally, they’re wrong, as Deputy Hancock (Charlene Amoia) is called out to a local mansion to find a party which has somehow turned into a bloodbath, and the naked form of a woman from her past, whom she’s less than pleased to see – not least because Hancock knows her to be dead. On taking the silent woman back to the station house, it transpires that everyone who sees her sees someone different, and in every case it’s someone they hate and fear from earlier in their lives. This leads to nightmarish visions and paranoid outbreaks which sorely test the sanity of the local law enforcers – and, as things get worse, build toward a mass outbreak of bizarre and life-threatening paranormal phenomena.

It soon becomes clear that the biggest problem with Grave Walkers may also be its principal strength: it’s a very ambitious production, realised on clearly limited resources. From the first moments there’s an odd contrast, as an admirably sharp-looking opening titles sequence gives way to somewhat flatter DV cinematography once the main action kicks in. The film also flits between monochrome and colour for reasons which are not readily apparent, and splits the action up into seven ‘chapters’ with slightly ostentatious titles; evocative of the likes of Kill Bill and/or Clerks, perhaps, but it still comes off a tad pretentious. There’s also quite a lot going on in terms of plot and character, with a pretty substantial central ensemble of law enforcers, convicts and assorted locals, most of whom have their own little stories going on, not to mention the fairly complex demonic mythology underpinning the whole thing. Kirschenbaum is to be admired for not leaving things simple, and wanting to keep the audience on their toes – but there’s no avoiding the sense that he and his team have bitten off more than they can chew.

As the two central good guys, Charlene Amoia and Vladimir Kulich make for competent leads, and we have a decent if brief cameo from the ever-reliable Tony Todd. Beyond this, however, the casting is variable; some actors just feel too far too am-dram to really get the job done, whilst others – most notably the two college metalhead-looking guys portraying the mysterious villains high on the FBI’s most wanted list – are plainly and simply miscast. The film is clearly also aiming to offer up a great visual spectacle, and while there are some shots and sequences which work, overall it’s a very awkward blend of overly glossy CGI and rather more mediocre practical work; digitally adding flies, smoke and glowing eyes will only go so far to distract from what are clearly simple rubber masks. If they’d had practical make-up to rival that of, say, James Sizemore’s The Demon’s Rook, it might have just about worked. Then again, Sizemore also had the good sense to simply allude to a broader demonic universe behind his story, rather than piling on the exposition as Kirschenbaum does here.

All in all, then, Grave Walkers is a let down, but it does have at least one bona fide ace up its sleeve; the soundtrack by Shawn Lee. It would have been easy for this film to wind up with another of those Carpenteresque synth scores which are rapidly becoming ten a penny; instead, Lee presents a largely psychedelic, full band-driven soundtrack reminiscent of Goblin and Fabio Frizzi at their funkiest – but still with a few synth-driven passages worked in. Hugely endearing, toe-tapping stuff – even if it’s not enough to make up for the film’s other problems.

Grave Walkers is out now on UK DVD and digital download, from Matchbox Films.

By Ben Bussey

I should probably open this with an NSFW disclaimer. Of course, if you’ve already clicked into this page, then you’ve seen the photo above. Sorry. Hope you didn’t just lose your job. But it serves you right for reading about a lesbian vampire movie in the workplace.

Anyway… I’d almost completely forgotten that this movie was on its way. It had been announced way back in 2014, not too long after the death of director José Ramón Larraz, that his 1974 erotic horror classic Vampyres had been remade. Reports that Larraz had been directly involved with the project from director Victor Matellano went some way to reassure fans of the original, but an early trailer which indicated something cut-price and TV movie-ish rather scuppered those hopes. Audience reaction is sure to vary according to familiarity with the original; though revered among 70s horror fans, Vampyres has never necessarily been one of those movies classed as essential viewing for all. That said, if you haven’t seen the original, I’d say you’ve missed out; and in this particular instance, I suspect that those who don’t know the original are probably less likely to take much enjoyment from this remake. If you know the original, you’ll go in understanding that the film is aiming for a surreal, dreamlike feel, and as such won’t be too taken aback by a multitude of scenes which – to the uninitiated – will just seem, well, a bit dumb.

Don’t get me wrong: this remake of Vampyres is, under any conditions, a very dumb movie. But of course, dumbness has never been a barrier to entertainment value, especially when it comes to low-rent T&A-driven horror. Happily, the Vampyres remake isn’t one of those all-too common contemporary takes on trash cinema which make a concerted effort to be silly, and deliberately draw attention to their own silliness in a nudge-nudge wink-wink way. No, this is entirely sincere trash, and given that it’s the work of a production company named Artistic Films (I LOL’d as soon as that name came up in the opening titles), it really would seem that most if not all the key players on board have gone into this fully intending to make a serious, cerebral movie – and these are the conditions under which the very best trash is made.

For the most part, the film is a very direct retread of what went before. The main thrust (heheh) of the film is identical: smoking hot vampire lovers Fran and Miriam (Marta Flich and Almudena León filling in for Marianne Morris and Anulka) live in a dilapidated Gothic mansion, where they lure unwitting men back to their victims by posing as hitch-hikers on the largely deserted country road. However, when Fran picks up her latest boy-toy Ted (Christian Stamm taking over from Murray Brown), she seems to take a particular liking to him, and opts to keep him alive longer, messing with his head and draining him that bit further night by night, whilst she and Miriam continue to bring more strangers home and drink them dry. However, some nearby campers start to suspect that something untoward is going on.

In these sequences, Matellano’s Vampyres is as good as a direct facsimile to Larraz’s original, right down to the largely identical dialogue – which comes off more than a little stilted and unnatural here, which one suspects is largely down to the fact that English isn’t the first language of most of the cast (unlike the original, this film was shot entirely in Spain with a largely local cast, which rather begs the question of why they didn’t just shoot it in Spanish). However, Matellano’s take embellishes matters by changing the victims-in-waiting from a couple in a caravan to three studenty friends sharing a tent, with frequent allusions to them being there in search of artistic inspiration in the vein of Byron, Polidori and the Shelleys at Villa Diodati. It’s fair to say the caravan couple are the least interesting aspect of the original, in which case it would probably have improved matters to leave them out of the remake altogether; beefing their roles up further only makes them less compelling, particularly with the addition of a half-arsed will-they-won’t-they love story which utterly fails to be of any interest whatsoever.

A more notable addition is the occasional cuts back to the local hotel, run by the movie’s one big genre star, Caroline Munro. Her presence is always likely to bring a smile to the face of any fan of 70s/80s cult fare, and she seems to be having fun as the wise and enigmatic woman who clearly knows more than she’s letting on, dropping constant warnings of the otherworldly dangers in the woods. The scenes don’t add a great deal to the mix, but unlike the scenes with the campers they’re at least an enjoyable distraction.

The 1974 original is noted for its pretty full-on scenes of sex and violence, particularly by comparison with similar themed movies made in Britain at the time (Hammer’s Karnstein trilogy is more or less family friendly by comparison). As such, there’s obviously the expectation that this new version will take a similar approach, and sure enough it does boast plenty of flesh and blood presented in an eye-catching manner. A slight problem, however, is that it doesn’t do anything particularly new; not content with regurgitating the dialogue, some of the sex scenes are also more or less direct facsimiles of those in the original right down to the positions. As for the violence; in attempting to up the ante there, the film makes some lamentable side-steps into torture porn territory. This feels particularly stale as Matellano opts to throw some Elizabeth Bathory references into the mix, a subject which was already delved into somewhat by Hostel Part 2; and, as may be evident from the top photo, the literal blood bath scene is more than a little reminiscent of the most famous moment from Eli Roth’s 2007 sequel.

It’s easy, then, to dismiss this new take on Vampyres as nothing more than another misguided remake which pales by comparison with the source material, and fails to build on it in any interesting ways. All things considered, though, I can’t deny I had fun with it. A bit of sexed-up vampire action is always a potent cocktail for simple, undemanding entertainment, and while Matellano’s movie might not quite match up to the power of Larraz’s original, it packs a good bit more sex and gore than a lot of similar movies do these days. No, it’s nothing you haven’t seen before, but that’s no prerequisite for 90 minutes of fun, is it?

Vampyres is available now on UK DVD from Soda Pictures. In the US, Artsploitation Films will release it to DVD on October 18th. Alternatively it’s also available on VOD from Vimeo now.

Vampyres from artsploitation on Vimeo.

By Ben Bussey

If you’ll pardon me starting off on a topical note; it’s hard not to see some parallels between the enduring filmmaking career of Rob Zombie, and the political progress of Donald Trump. Hear me out on this one. From the very beginning, few people expected either man to succeed in their new field; why, it seemed like they were doing it simply because they could, just for shits and giggles, and common sense dictated they wouldn’t stick at it long before heading back to the world they knew. But no; they kept at it. And with time, their following grew more and more devoted. Whilst despairing critics cried at every turn, “that’s it, he’s screwed the pooch this time, no one will support him anymore,” we were proved wrong at every turn. It made no difference how blatant their mistakes were, how much their output lacked anything of real substance, how flagrantly dim-witted and lowest-common-denominator their approach seemed to be; their ardent followers loved every second of it. So it is that neither man appears to have learned from their mistakes, or even acknowledge that any mistakes were made, and continues to bloody-mindedly follow the exact same path regardless.

The difference, of course, is that a new Rob Zombie movie poses no actual threat to anyone.

Okay, enough half-arsed political allegory; I should hope you see my point. Die-hard Rob Zombie fans aren’t going to give a shit either way what I have to say about 31; if you love his existing body of cinematic work, odds are you’ll love this too, because – just as we’d expected from the day the film was announced – it’s more of the same. As such, if you hate Rob Zombie’s filmography to date, 31 obviously isn’t going to do a damn thing to change your opinion either.

But for the apparent few who are comparatively neutral on Rob Zombie – and I count myself among this number – it’s hard to greet 31 with anything but a sad sigh of resignation. With the two-volume misstep that was the Halloween reboot now properly behind him, there was the possibility that Zombie could really start to break out in new directions; indeed, given that he’s known to have been unsuccessfully trying to get ice hockey movie Broad Street Bullies off the ground for some time, there have long been clear indications that the writer-director’s heart just isn’t in horror anymore. Even so, his last movie The Lords of Salem proved to be, I think, his most rewarding film to date (though I admit it took me a couple of viewings to really appreciate it), and if he continued further down that path – making fucked-up, strange films purely to please himself – then Zombie’s future looked bright. Alas, with 31 he would appear to have made a movie designed first and foremost to please his fans, which feels like a major step backwards.

Plot-wise, there isn’t too much to tell; bunch of 40-plus white trash carnies (well okay, a few of them are black) drive up a dusty southern road on October 31st 1976, in scenes which might have been lifted directly from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre except for how much older the passengers are, and how much colourful profanity spills out of their mouths. Not too long after nightfall, a strange roadblock stops them dead in their tracks, and they’re under attack; next thing they know, the five survivors find themselves on their knees in some sort of abandoned factory, being looked down upon by three absurd looking, plummy-accented aristocrats in heavy make-up and giant wigs, being tended to by naked slave girls in masks. The carnies have been selected to play the game they call 31, which presumably refers only to the date as there certainly aren’t that many participants, nor is it played out over that many hours. The rules are simple; if the captives can survive the night in the factory, during which time they will come under attack from a variety of costumed assailants, then they can leave. But it’s made abundantly clear that the odds are against them.

It does sound like a potentially fun idea, and done right it no doubt could have been an engrossing fight to the death exploitationer in the vein of The Running Man or Death Race 2000. However, Rob Zombie once again made that fatal mistake he keeps on making, which never fails to scupper his efforts: he insisted on writing the thing himself. This, I have no doubt, is the key thing holding Zombie back as a filmmaker. As a director, he isn’t bad at all; he’s a great audio-visual stylist with an eye for memorable imagery and iconography, hence his creation Captain Spaulding has become one of the most iconic horror characters of the 21st century thus far (31’s Doom Head is clearly intended to follow suit, but – despite the best efforts of actor Richard Brake – falls short). As a writer, though, Zombie simply isn’t up to scratch. In every instance, his films feel like they’re made from a first draft script, bulging with terrible dialogue which no doubt sounded sharp and witty in his head but falls flat on delivery. And in 31, it doesn’t even feel like he’s trying. The premise suggests a thrill-a-minute, anything can happen at any time atmosphere, and yet it’s all staggeringly predictable.

Much has been made of how the film had to go by the MPAA a few times to avoid an NC-17 rating (for what it’s worth the film got an 18 with no cuts from the BBFC, although it’s feasible this was a pre-cut version), and sure enough it’s as gory as you’d expect in places, but there isn’t much here that’s likely to shock any seasoned horror fan, and certainly not anyone who’s seen Rob Zombie’s other movies. Why, you’re liable to be every bit as unfazed by it all as Malcolm McDowell clearly is; and who can blame him, he’s seen it all before and more, he was in Caligula after all.

In summation, the only thing truly surprising about 31 is that Sherri Moon Zombie doesn’t get her arse out once. Other than that, it’s the same old same old. Once again, though, if you like Rob Zombie movies, you may well still enjoy 31. For everyone else, there really isn’t any point giving it the time of day.

31 is in UK cinemas and on VOD now from Vertigo Releasing.

By Ben Bussey

While sex work in any capacity tends to be euphemistically dubbed ‘the oldest profession,’ no facet of that field is more uniquely modern than that of the cam girl, a performer entertaining untold numbers of strangers online with intimate displays into webcams. Naturally this is a subject matter that’s begging to be explored on film, as it not only offers ample opportunity for classic titillation tactics, it also presents us with compelling questions as to just what drives people to get into this line of work, as well as what might drive those who patronize their service. This, put very simply, is what BB is all about, and from that bare-bones premise we might easily anticipate something very sleazy and exploitative, particularly once we factor in that the central character is also gay, and much of the film’s early scenes are taken up by sex scenes. However, while the feature debut from director CJ Wallis is indeed filled to the brim with nudity and sexual content, with more than a dash of horror movie in the mix, the primary emphasis is on character-based drama, exploring themes of isolation, loneliness and miscommunication, and the strange way in which these feelings are only intensified by modern communications technology which should, in theory, be bringing us closer together.

We meet LA resident Leah (Jennifer Mae) as she enters what would appear to be some kind of modelling studio for a job interview. Given that moments later she’s asked to strip naked, we know right away it’s not for catalogue work. It transpires Leah is looking into cam girl work as her girlfriend Alina (Victoria Fox) needs to visit her hometown of Bucharest due to a family crisis, but can’t afford the air fare. Soon enough, Leah covers her cropped bleached hair with a glossy pink wig, dabs on a little make-up, adopts a chirpier persona and starts putting on daily webcam shows under the name Candy Cummings, and she proves popular enough to not only pay Alina’s air fare, but also earn them an indulgent weekend in Vegas beforehand. Everything seems to have worked out as planned – but then, once Alina goes away, things start going sour. Leah’s calls and messages go unanswered, and as weeks go by she finds herself alone, with no company but the anonymous strangers picking up her webcam feed. Worse yet, one of her more devoted viewers, Hal (Kristian Hanson), has developed an unhealthy fixation on the woman he knows only as Candy Cummings. And as Hal’s knowledge of information technology extends far beyond knowing how to visit a cam girl site, he begins to intrude on her life beyond the webcam.

A lot of modern indie film seems keen to muddy the waters between art house and grindhouse, and BB sits well in this climate, yet also manages to feel fairly fresh and individual. CJ Wallis (a seasoned short film and music video director, but surely best known to indie horror fans for his on-and-off camera roles on 2009’s Dead Hooker in a Trunk) reportedly took on the bulk of the key filmmaking roles during production, and clearly made the film with limited means at his disposal: small budget, small cast, with much of the action confined to a few key locations. The press release informs us this was very much intentional to promote an indie feel, as was the decision to use largely inexperienced actors. It does come as a surprise that Jennifer Mae, who also receives credit for co-creating her character with Wallis, has never acted on film before, as she gives a terrific performance. It’s certainly a demanding role, given that she’s on camera for more or less the duration of the movie, alone and naked for a great deal of that time, but she does tremendous work commanding the viewer’s attention, her lack of ‘actor’-ish affectations enhancing the overall sense of naturalism (it seems likely that a lot of her webcam scenes are at least partially improvised).

A key question that many will no doubt ask is the spirit in which BB approaches the main character; given the subject matter, there’s obviously the potential for the film to come off judgemental, voyeuristic and misogynistic. This definitely isn’t the case, although it’s perhaps unavoidable that at least a hint of voyeurism comes into the picture; let’s not be coy, the abundance of bare flesh is a key part of what will sell the film to many viewers. Happily, BB does not cast the first stones at either webcam performers or their viewers; indeed, one scene sees a fan of ‘Candy Cummings’ explain how watching her shows every night fills a gap in his otherwise lonely life. Sure, this might come off as sad, but as I think can be said of pornography in general, there’s nothing inherently wrong with it so long as everyone involved understands where the parameters lie.

Alas, the live webcam show’s increased sense of intimacy may well result in some of those blurred lines the poet Mr Thicke told us about, particularly if the person on the other end of the feed is both lonely and suffering mental health issues – and this is where Kristian Hanson’s Hal comes in. Intriguingly, his is actually the first face we’re shown and the first voice we hear in the film, and it’s notable that, while it’s immediately obvious he has problems, neither Hanson nor Wallis ever portray the character as an outright villain or psychopath. In a curious way, his problems begin to mirror Leah’s as the film progresses and her own sanity is tested – but given that Hal’s actions play a key role in her troubles, he can’t come off as too sympathetic.

Still, discussing BB purely in terms of narrative and character in some respects seems to be missing the point, as in large part the film is driven purely by mood. As well as being handsomely shot, the film also boasts an eclectic soundtrack, prominently featuring a number of songs by Mother Marygold which are utilised as a form of oblique narration. It’s similar to how Sean Spillane’s songs were used in Lucky McKee’s The Woman (although sonically speaking they’re worlds apart); as such, the music often feels intrusive and at odds with the action, but it does play a vital role in promoting a sense of tension which is more or less consistent throughout the entire running time.

It may revert to more obvious genre movie territory by the final act, and no doubt it will leave some viewers questioning just what it’s saying about the age of internet porn (not that there should be anything wrong in a film leaving you asking questions); but all in all, BB is never less than compelling viewing, and is well worth your time and money.

BB is available for download (along with its soundtrack) at BitTorrent Now.

By Ben Bussey

It seems like we’ve been calling practical special effects and special make-up effects a dying art for more than twenty years, yet here we are in 2016 and the art form still has vast swathes of admirers advocating its return to prominence in a cinematic landscape which seems overrun with CGI. This new documentary from the makers of 2012’s Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan may seem to be primarily an exercise in nostalgia, in that it casts a wistful, even elegiac eye back over decades of classic movie creature work which seemed to have been stopped in its tracks in the wake of Jurassic Park and the rise of digital creatures. However, this isn’t a simple-minded ‘practical good, CG bad’ diatribe; rather, it’s an exploration of the many different ways in which filmmakers can bring the products of their imagination to life on screen, and how more often than not a judicious combination of the various approaches (which, not for nothing, was very much the case on Jurassic Park) proves to be the most fruitful path.

Creature Designers: The Frankenstein Complex may have a somewhat ostentatious title, hinting at a deep psychological exploration of the drive to create monsters, but it’s ultimately directors Alexandre Poncet and Gilles Penso present us with a fairly grounded chronicle of the creature FX industry. Much of it isn’t necessarily telling as much we haven’t heard before, but it does take a fairly fresh angle inasmuch as its told for the most part from the point of view of the FX artists themselves, without too much input from the directors who generally take the spotlight. It also takes an interesting approach in that, in many instances, actual footage from the films in question is absent; it seems fair to assume that for the most part this would be down to the inability to secure the rights to this footage, but in a curious way it is worked to the film’s advantage, as instead we’re shown behind the scenes stills and test footage, allowing us to focus on the creatures from a technical and creative standpoint.

As you’d expect, Rick Baker and Greg Nicotero feature prominently, but so to do a great many perhaps less celebrated creature masters such as the Chiodo Brothers, Steve Johnson, John Vulich, Tom Woodruff Jr and Alec Gillis. Whilst naturally the film touches on the original make-up masters Lon Chaney, Jack Pierce and Bud Westmore, as well as stop-motion pioneers Willis O’Brien and Ray Harryhausen, the main focus of the film is the mid-70s to the mid-90s, when the term ‘special make-up effects’ first came into common use and animatronics allowed for more complex and lifelike creatures than had ever been shown on screen before – many the handiwork of the late, great Stan Winston. But as the documentary highlights, hand in hand with this was a decline in the use of the much-loved stop motion approach, with CG coming increasingly into the mix. Again, the film does not play this as a negative in and of itself, but it does explore how many creature masters – Rob Bottin being a notable example – grew increasingly disillusioned with filmmakers opting for the ‘fix it in post’ approach all too often, whilst audiences routinely assume that any handmade creations which do make the screen must have been created on computer.

It’s an affectionate treatment of the subject matter, and for the most part an interesting one. Honestly though, even at only 107 minutes it perhaps feels a little longer than it needs to be, largely because some of the interview subjects don’t add a great deal to the mix; the decision to give a few minutes over to Kevin Smith is a bit bewildering, given the director doesn’t have a great deal of experience with creature FX himself and mostly waxes lyrical about Jaws and Star Wars; hardly earth-shattering. Happily, we also have Guillermo del Toro on board for some more erudite insight into what draws us to monsters.

Anyone with a particular interest in the technical side of genre filmmaking will definitely want to track this documentary down, but for everyone else it isn’t necessarily a must-see; for the most part it feels a bit too much like an extended DVD extra. Still, it’s good fun, and does boast an enjoyable extra in a full-length video recording (very badly filmed, sadly) of Guillermo del Toro in an hour-long conversation with Tony Timpone at the Fantasia Film Festival 2015, mostly discussing the allure of monsters and how practical FX are essential to his filmmaking process.

Creature Designers: The Frankenstein Complex is out on DVD on 3rd October 2016, from Studiocanal.

By Dustin Hall

Blair Witch, the surprise sequel to the original smash The Blair Witch Project is upon us. Creeping out of the woods seemingly from nowhere, this movie brings its audience full circle, trapping us in a sort of time loop… Jesus, do I hear Limp Bizkit playing off in the distance? Let me get my chain wallet on just in case. We’ve come back around into the late nineties to once again visit the first-person world of Burkittsville. But to what end?

As a film, this new Blair Witch is an odd creation, delivered to us at an odd time. It’s not an anniversary of the original film, nor have any great nostalgic longings been publicly mused to a receptive online audience. If anything, The Blair Witch Project has been mentioned more than anything else as the mother-film that birthed a genre that has over-stayed its welcome and, with the end of the Paranormal Activity franchise, is now mostly dead. Was this, then, an attempt to revive first-person cinema? Or was it an attempt to again take the crown as the greatest first-person horror from Johnny-come-lately installments such as Cloverfield and Troll Hunter? Or, most likely and more horribly, was it simply the death throes of a desperate and creatively bereft horror arm of a major studio?

Regardless, Blair Witch is a solidly put together found-footage film. It stands as one of the best in the genre. However, if you already hated found-footage movies, this one probably isn’t going to change your mind. The D+ Cinemascore opening day audiences gave this film doesn’t bode well for converts. And keep in mind that calling it ‘best among found-footage movies’ isn’t exactly setting the bar too high, in a genre filled with about as much throwaway, low budget dreck as the preceding 20 years of slasher films had brought us. However, I know that I personally was a fan of the original film. It was ahead of its time, a then fairly unique film backed with viral marketing including faux documentary pieces and websites. Though watching the film now without the benefit of the verisimilitude of it being an actual vanishing case undoubtedly robs The Blair Witch Project of much of its power, it still stands as a fair film with a simple, thought provoking mythology behind it. It’s such a shame, then, that neither of the sequels have known what to do to create a franchise from the once-revered original, at first going in a completely opposite direction, and now trying too hard to copy it.

Reader advisory: moderate spoilers ahead.

The film revolves around James, the younger brother of Heather, who died in the first film. Thanks to a recently posted viral video, he believes that Heather may somehow still be alive, despite twenty years of time having passed since she vanished. So, teaming up with his girlfriend, conveniently a documentarian, and a crew of friends, they again enter the woods to see if they can find clues about the mysteries of the Blair Witch and the deaths that have plagued the area. As this leads to another series of nights lost in seemingly endless woods, spooky noises, screaming, darkness, and abrupt endings. Again if you enjoyed the original, expect more of the same. If it wasn’t your thing, you’ll still hate this.

Blair Witch does offer a few genuinely neat additions to the retreading of the original work. There’s some nice body horror, as shown in the trailer, involving a centipede trapped in a leg wound, as well as some Descent-like moments of claustrophobic terror in a water-filled subterranean tunnel. Generally, the last twenty-or-so minutes of the film move quickly and have lots of crazy, frantic moments of chasing and various phobias on display, it’s all very effective. The real question is whether or not audiences will have the endurance to get there.

In the meantime, there are lots of weaknesses on display as well. Blair Witch relies too heavily on gimmicky film techniques from advances in film technology, which it is all too happy to show off during the film’s set-up. “Look, how neat is our new drone camera?” “We’ve all got GoPros strapped to our heads!” “We have remote security cameras all around our camp!” Aside from how annoying this is, and how they use the GoPros with their seemingly infinite batteries to create 1-2 shots during conversations, it is absolutely mind boggling how none of it actually generates any payoff. In the Paranormal Activity films, at least a home camcorder strapped to an old rotary fan creates a jump scare later in the film. None of the gadgets in this film, aside from the GoPros, ever actually show the audience anything of importance. The drone, the security cameras, the B-crew that get lost off on their own, nothing is ever shown to the audience.

Perhaps the strangest omission in Blair Witch is any attempt to play with the mythology of the first film’s existence. There are many references to the legends of the witch from the first movie, but at no point does anyone reference the fact that Heather and crew were put in a documentary which everyone would have seen. No one questions whether it might have been a witch, or hillbillies, no one references the connections between the stick-men and the house that they find which were clearly shown in the documentary footage from Blair Witch Project. Rather, we get some strange new additions to the mythos, such as the witch having been tortured on a rack, her only being able to kill you if you look at her (something the film itself contradicts) and a boat-load of time travel. Also, something never addressed, is this film also a documentary? What is the film we are supposedly watching? Does this film also end up released into the world, and prove that Heather and her crew were locked in a time paradox before being killed? We see the witch this time around… did Josh just somehow prove the existence of the paranormal to the world? This all just got a bit too meta.

Maybe I’m asking too many questions, and maybe Blair Witch doesn’t deserve this much thought. But in the end that might be the film’s main problem. It’s not a bad film in its own right, but it tries to build upon the original film, which was a simple and effective story, a campfire tale, and creates something which generates more questions than it answers, and leans on more gimmicks than payoffs. In the end, it comes off standing in the shadows of its predecessors, and failing to create anything of its own. It would be a sad, but also fitting, place to end the found footage genre.

Blair Witch is in cinemas now.

By Quin

If you have ever handled a VHS tape, you may remember the advisory written on the edge telling you not to touch the tape inside. Some tapes also had instructions as to which end to insert into the VCR – which always seemed intuitive enough to me. But that advisory always made me wonder what would happen if I did open up the back and run my finger along the tape. I can even remember pushing the little button on the side and flipping it open, but I never did touch the tape. I think I probably didn’t want to risk erasing the film. VHS tapes used to be ridiculously expensive and who would want to risk having to buy a rental?

That VHS advisory is the basis for House of VHS, a French film with a multinational cast from director Gautier Cazenave. Here the advisory is really more of a warning. We all know, in films like this, no one follows warnings.

A group of friends have driven to the countryside in France to stay in an abandoned old house. The power and water are turned off. While searching for a way to turn it back on, one of them finds a big box of VHS tapes and a small television and an ancient VCR. They distinctly talk about the advisory on the tapes, but tape gets touched and then they all start binge watching tape after tape until things start to get strange.

That’s a short synopsis, but this movie has a pretty bare bones plot. The pacing throughout is off-putting. The set-up of the group driving to their destination with the getting-to-know-you chit-chat combined with searching the house for electricity literally takes up almost half the movie, and these characters are stereotypes with absolutely no depth. You never really get to know them or care about them.

It should also be noted, there is no real horror until the final moments of the film. I’m guessing most of you would be disappointed by this, so now it won’t be a surprise. The scenes without power could have been creepy. It’s daylight outside, but the characters opt to use flashlights instead of opening shutters. This all reads to the viewer as ridiculous, but the sort of jokey tone in the first half makes me wonder if the director thought this was funny. While horror-comedy is always a slippery slope for me, almost all attempts at amusement fall flat in this film. Although I did laugh surprisingly hard at a mispronunciation of “laser disc” early in the movie. I won’t tell you what it is exactly so you can have that one small moment too if you decide to see this.

Where the film gets a little interesting and may appeal to fans of old B-movies is when the group starts watching the videos. Two of the first titles they discover are “Attack of the Two Headed Invaders” and “Sasquatch Returns” which don’t ring any bells for me. Initially, I was impressed at how vintage the footage shown looked, but then I started to notice some things that I recognized. They showed the ghouls in the water from Carnival of Souls as well as scenes from Santa Claus Conquers the Martians and The Brain that Wouldn’t Die. It seems to me like they were determined to make use of films that are now in the public domain and have no copyright, which is what MSTK and Elvira used to do. While the collection of clips here are pretty great and edited together in an interesting and at times artful way – it just goes on way too long. You will probably fall asleep way before anybody in the movie does – and they do.

If you are a fan of old horror movies and comedy I would recommend tracking down a copy It Came From Hollywood. It’s a 1982 film featuring clips of B-movies with skits in between featuring John Candy, Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner and Cheech and Chong. And for the fan of more serious (and sometimes unintentionally hilarious) horror I’d check out Terror in the Aisles. It’s a 1984 documentary about horror films and the things that scare us narrated by Donald Pleasance and Nancy Allen. But as for House of VHS, I’d steer clear of it completely.

House of VHS is out on DVD in Australia from 21st September (pre-order here), or on demand from Vimeo right now, via Bounty Films.

House of VHS (2016) aka Ghost in the Machine from Bounty Films on Vimeo.

1999 saw the sudden emergence of a fairly unique cinematic trend: glossy Biblical horror movies with Gabriel Byrne in them. One of these was End of Days, which cast the charismatic Irish actor as Satan and pit him against a grizzled Arnold Schwarzenegger, who’s charged with protecting the main girl from The Craft from getting deflowered by Old Scratch and thus being impregnated with the Anti-Christ. The other film was, of course, Stigmata, which cast Byrne (boasting quite possibly the exact same hair, make-up and costume, the collar notwithstanding) as a Catholic priest sent to investigate reports of a young woman who seems to be suffering the bizarre phenomenon of the title. All things considered, End of Days is the more enjoyable film (come on, Arnie versus Beelzebub!), but this is not to say that Stigmata isn’t of some entertainment value.

Make no mistake, though, most of the pleasure to be taken from Stigmata comes from the fact that it’s a kind of film we see very few of nowadays: a mid-budget, fairly high production value, R-rated mainstream genre film (reportedly made for $29 million) which isn’t based on a pre-existing property. With the rise of Platinum Dunes in the 2000s and Blumhouse in the 2010s, studio horror ( particularly at the R-rated end) has tended toward much lower budget productions since, allowing only for smaller-scale, more down-to-earth visions – and one thing Stigmata most definitely isn’t is down to earth. However, it isn’t only in representing a now largely dead model of horror movie that Stigmata embodies its era; it may have come at the tail end of the 1990s, but Rupert Wainwright’s film wears its decade on its sleeve more heavily the many other films I could name, and in a strange way this ages Stigmata worse than some films that are ten or twenty years older. Nor is that where Stigmata’s problems end.

Anyway, synopsis time: Byrne’s Andrew Kiernan, on top of being a priest, is also a scientist, and in this capacity he is sent around the globe by the shady Cardinal Houseman (an inevitably bearded and very English Jonathan Pryce) to investigate reported miracles around the globe. Invariably all of his investigations uncover some mundane rational explanation, which leaves Kiernan a bit bummed out; but then he happens upon a South American church in which a statue of the Virgin of Guadalupe is shedding tears of blood, and when he’s unable to find a scientific cause he thinks he may have found a bona fide miracle. However, the moustache-twirling Cardinal has other ideas, and instead sends Kiernan to Pittsburgh, where Frankie (Patricia Arquette) – a twentysomething party girl hairdresser, and an atheist – has suddenly been afflicted with gaping puncture wounds in her wrists, and lashes across her back; two of the five wounds suffered by Christ at his crucifixion. As her condition worsens, Frankie shows violent signs of possession; but just what is possessing her, and why? Would you believe it’s one of those ‘the truth is out there’ deals that were so big in the 90s?

As for other stuff that was big in the 90s… let’s see. Trip-hop, day-glo raver gear and platform shoes, crop tops revealing pierced belly-buttons with small accompanying tribal-looking tattoo, Bjork-style pixie hair with little bunches (I don’t know what the hell the correct name is for that hair style, I just call it Bjork hair): name your 90s cliche, and Stigmata has it. If the film had a flavour, it’d be lemon Hooch. Let’s not forget the inflatable chairs; Frankie’s apartment, in which a large portion of the action takes place, has no fewer than four of them scattered around the place, and one has to ponder how safe that is given that Frankie also seems to constantly have several hundred candles burning about the place day and night. Additionally, one also has to ponder how a hairdresser makes enough money to pay for this massive open-plan industrial chic partygirl pad. But then, such narrative logic obviously comes secondary to the director’s wish to present his fetching leading lady in a stylish environment, which looks cool under atmospheric lighting and lends itself well to flashy editing.

Nor does the lack of narrative logic end there, as once the final reel kicks in and the post-X-Files/pre-Da Vinci Code conspiracy twist is revealed, the reasons behind Frankie’s possession prove more than a little hard to swallow; I won’t go into specifics to avoid spoilers, but if the overall message is supposedly one of hope, all the suffering seems a bit unnecessary. But then, maybe that’s just me not getting Christianity.

Considering the calibre of the cast, we can be forgiven for wishing for better material for them to play with; it’s quite clear that all of them were slumming it a bit, and in Byrne’s case this is a bit disheartening considering that he has largely retreated from mainstream film in the 17 years since (the guy started out the 90s with Miller’s Crossing, for crying out loud). As for Arquette, given her current outspoken feminism it’s doubtful she looks back on this as a particular career highlight, seeing as how she’s used primarily as eye candy; we can scarcely fail to note her first wound occurs during a voyeuristic bathtub scene. Pryce, meanwhile – coming to this not long after being one of the naffest Bond villains in Tomorrow Never Dies – seems to have comfortably resigned himself to the fate of all British actors, getting stuck in a two-dimensional bad guy role.

Stigmata also proved one of the last big screen outings to date from Rupert Wainwright, whose background was mainly in music videos (and boy does it show). He’s made only one more feature since, the remake of The Fog; I’ve never seen it, but have heard it often described as one of the worst films of its sort, which I have no problem believing. His work here is, in some respects, the worst kind of Michael Bay-ish style over substance filmmaking; drowning in excess visual flash, yet under some illusions of telling a story of actual importance. But hey – the very best paracinema is invariably the work of those who approach their work more seriously than they should. As a would-be thought-provoking theological treatise put to film, Stigmata is pretty laughable; but as a histrionic melodrama and a gaudy 1990s time capsule, it’s kind of hard to fault. Ultimately it’s just The Exorcist remade on the set of The Crow, and I doubt anyone involved expected anything more or less.

As for the disc: the film looks and sounds as good as you’d hope, and the extras include a commentary from Wainwright which I haven’t listened to, a trailer, and a corny 30-minute featurette which is half standard making-of, half History Channel examination of the stigmata phenomenon.

Stigmata is out on dual format Blu-ray and DVD in the UK on 17th October, from Eureka.