Vampire Ecstacy

Luv me some sexay vampire movies, and this film is a fine, fine example from the early 70’s, when skinsploitation had crept into most genres. This one involves a group of 4 or 5 naïfs visiting a castle in the back hills of Germany. The castle is run by a satanic priestess or somesuch (Wanda) who is trying to pave the way for the return of a powerful Baroness vampire. This involves a lot of mind control. Much of this mind control is achieved through nekkid/body painted ritual dancing by Wanda and her coven in the basement to the tune of the devilbongos. There is a LOT of this. This is a good thing. This movie gets special recognition for the most suggestively shaped candles in a non-porn movie.

This movie had great atmosphere, the castle setting really delivered the goods (in more ways than one), even though the movie really held no scares or even much blood. Several of the darker shots in the movie are a little too dark, making some of those scenes an audio-only affair, such as the bat attack. The good news is the bat attack denuded the remaining clothed woman, thus earning the movie the much lauded Golden Treehorn. Speaking of nekkidity, the lead naïf, Marie Forsa, has her ample ‘talents’ on display for one reason or another throughout the film. She is the initial target of the coven, her virgin body to be used a vessel for the return of the Vampiress. Well they eventually have to find a new vessel, because……well don’t let me ruin it. I will just say it is worth a watch if you like horror movies with great ambiance and gobs of eye candy, the flavor that the 70’s brought us in many of the horror/exploitation films from that period.

3 Georges and a Golden Treehorn

Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead (2006)

If you are having a horror moviethon with a group of fellow enthusiasts or just need to 'clear the decks' after watching a poor horror movie, then pop a Troma movie into your DVD player. It really serves as a great mental palate cleanser. Well, cleanse is not an appropriate word, as there is nothing 'clean' about this movie. Troma really has cornered the market on funny/gross/tastless/outlandish/sometimes horrifiying content in their movies and their latest feature really serves as another solid example of this in their canon.

It involves a fastfood chicken franchise built on sacred burial ground and the resultant wave of chicken/hominid zombies which wages a very messy assault on the employees therein. It comes packed to the gills with buckets of blood/fluid splatters, piles of dismembered limbs, reams of crude jokes and gags, and handfuls of bared breasts. It never terrifies, as Troma is never one to take themselves too seriously. Per their norm, they are too busy trying to get to the next sight gag, deluge of blood, or shot of gratuitous nudity - often some delightful combination thereof. The acting is amateur at best, budget is obviously low, and again these are known factors when sitting down to watch a Troma feature. The new aspect that Troma reveals with this movie is several musical numbers. Now I know what you might be saying, "Karl, Fuck that shit, I hate musicals!" or possibly just wretching uncontrollably at the mere mention of the word. Well, there are only a few songs, and they are suitably crude and funny, per Troma's gutter levels of taste. I actually enjoyed them.
I know! It seems like crazy talk, but I speak the truth.

So with all the given pros and cons that Troma brings to the table, this one rates a solid 3 Georges.

Poultrygeist (2006)

Lloyd Kaufman is nothing if not consistent. I wouldn't quite go so far to say that if you've seen one Troma movie blah, blah, blah. But you can count on either Awful or Awesome, depending on your personal proclivities.

Poultrygeist is, as to be expected, both. In their trademark Troma Independent "Reel Cinema" manner they've inflicted multiple stab wounds into all of the current pop culture illusions, foibles, and just plain fuck-ups. In short order, this fast-food flesh-filled feast of a flick will have you laughing in the mirror of:

• Fast Food Culture
• College
• Empty Causes
• Lipstick Lesbians
• Patriotism
• Muslims
• Vegan Whores
• Black Pride
• Crass Capitalism
• Marketing
• Fetisism
• Musicals
• Hollywood
• Obesity

and

• Terrorism

Along the while you're assaulted by the fully-automatic stream of Troma bad puns ("Sappho B. Anthony") and twisted movie quotes ("You had me from shit-covered mongoloid.") It's a steady stream of laughing, titillation, abject gore, and then the eventual orgy of all three together. This is the Troma formula and it has worked well for them for decades.

Is it horror? Does it scare you, gross you out, make you feel vulnerable or just plain creepy? Are there breasts and killers and things you generally wouldn't plan to view in front of your mother?

The answer to all of these is yes... but with a serious caveat. Troma cinema has always leaned closer to comedy and exploitation than the conventional trappings of the horror film. Each film has been more overt in its social commentary than the last one. There aren't moody scores or carefully lit sets to emphasize the mystery of the creature lurking in the dark. Nope, it's Tromaville. Welcome to fast-talking topless female lead characters and buckets of goo spewing from the mouths of roomfuls of extras and splattered across the walls of brightly lit sets with chicken people and Joe Fleishaker. It's horror, but somehow not horror.

In any event, George has just thrown up three gooey chicken eggs. Bock bock bock. This must mean:

Fun & Games

Since I'm stuck in Arizona (and not raising him), and I forgot to post these last week when I found them, I present to you the following Entertainment Weekly columns. This way you can exercise your brains instead of annoying Karl's wife.

The top 20 (according to them) horror movies of the last 20 years. I will say that I don't agree with all of them.

And an interactive quiz - admittedly, I didn't do so well. I won't post my score - I don't want Jeff to revoke my "Dudes" decoder ring.

Vampire Junction (2001)

From the onset, there is absolutely no doubt that the budget of this film is in an altitude limbo contest with the instincts of the director: which will sink lower? The tug of war between these two contestants painfully drags across the surreal cinematic landscape of this bizarre opus for seemingly four and a half hours. It's up for the viewer to decide who wins, and I'm here to tell ya that you should prepare for a photo finish.

In actuality, this film clocks in with a running time of 1:35 but since most of the scenes are presented at one third the normal speed you risk burning in your television screen with images of Eurpoean ass pimples. As the war between the questions of "what is the minimum effort we can get away with paying for this shot?" wages between "what can my strange, aged libido rationalize asking these young actresses to do?" there is another competition afoot. Which out of shape and unappealing actress will chalk up the most utterly (read udderly) unasked for nude scenes on film: Kathy Bates or Lina Romay? Who fucking cares? But Lina has definitely upped the ante here.

When all is said and done this film doesn't truly deserve much attention. I want to pan this thing into a stinking George pile, but there is a conflict raging within me, too. My horror senses weren't left entirely untingled while watching the intentional and unintentional perversities in this film exchange... err... licks. Vampire Junction is like Ed Wood directing a softcore porn flick while praying through time to David Lynch for inspiration. For this- and for the horrifying juxtaposition of gorgeous and gross specimens of femininity blearily basking in their own dreamy decadence for the benefit of Billy the Kidd in a store bought Bela Lugosi-era Dracula cape- I give this film a Silver(?) Treehorn and an arguably deserving two Georges... one for each side of the many conflicts battling against one another in this grand cinematic hypocrisy. Perhaps in ten years we can make the call whether or not Jess Franco's classic films won out over his later shames to prevent his total loss of genre credibility.

Vampire Junction (2001)

This movie is proof that a Golden Treehorn (100% of the females get nekkid) award is not indicative of quality. This vampire flick has something to do with a journalist in a wild west town in New Mexico and there are a pair of lesbian vampires and a cowboy vampire. Other than that, I can't tell what the fuck the story was. The movie consisted of a horrid music score of jagged synth, freeform jazz, and bizarre symphonic spurts; early 80's style music video editing and effects; and almost continuous softcore sex between 2-3 women. I must say, of all the movies I have seen with a female 3-way, this is the one that least held my interest. Jess Franco is still horny, but clearly he has gone senile.

1 George (for the attractive female vampire) and a reluctant Golden Treehorn

One Eyed Monster (2008)

Karl did me a solid and provided a guided "fast forward" presentation of this film. The "Karl's Notes" version, as it were. So I haven't seen every second of footage, but I trust my fellow Dude that nothing crucial was omitted during his tour. Too long to be a comment (which is where I began posting this) but too reliant on a previous Dude's effort to stand on it's own, I present my "Fast Track Addendum" to One Eyed Monster.

I have to say it's a damn shame the decision was made to seek an R-rating for this flick. I agree with Karl that Troma could have handled this film better with respect to nudity and gore, but Troma has never approached this level of quality in any of their productions. The writing was well done and acted out a hell of a lot better than you typically find in films with premises this absurd. Even the score was good. Sure, it's chock full of Aliens parallels but in a movie centered around Ron Jeremy's killer cock on the loose these stolen scenes come off (ha ha) as more of a homage than a rip-off.

This film is a comedy at heart which mixes fact and fiction to construct a soapbox for real-life porn stars to wax poetic over their golden years from. I have to admit that I thought it was intriguing and it elicited more than a few laughs out loud. But so did Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind... doesn't mean ol' George wants anything to do with it here.

What this film needed was a lack of restraint. An injection of Troma's inhibition into this production could have created a non-rated masterpiece. This monster needed a some hot gory blood pumping into it's flaccid member. It needed full frontal nudity and scenes of graphic- not implied- penetration. A script with aged porn star characters bemoaning their faded glory status and yearning to recapture the thrill and sensationalism of their youth was well served by real-life ex-porn star actors in the very same predicament. Tragically, what made the One Eyed Monster limp was the failure of these actors to rise to the challenge of going balls-and-all in a horror movie context.

Flaccid Treehorn, indeed.

Desert of Blood (2008)

Soo.....meh
That pretty much sums up my overall impression of this dusty pile of mess.
A poorly written/acted/directed slowly paced vampire film that takes place in Mexico involving star crossed lovers, one of them being a vampire that was buried by the town priest years before.

It starts promisingly with some topless sunbathing, but quickly devolves into a plodding amateurish mess. And not a fun mess, not unintentionally hilarious, and it had almost zero 'hidden gem' quotable lines. And you are going to make a crappy horror movie, at least show us some skin. And it does at first, but then it teases throughout the rest of the film, showing us plenty of attractive women yet missing every opportunity to show us more of them.

1 George and a Blue Treehorn (for all the wasted flesh potential)

Desert of Blood (2008)

There's a reason why you see a great pair of teeth... err... teats in the opening minutes of this film: once you're done gawking at Annika Svedman's pear-like plushies, there is absolutely nothing left to sit through this film for. Sadly, that includes Jackie Freed's topless scene where it is painfully obvious that her buxom bosoms were delivered as naturally as the strained acting of her cast mates. An apt title for a film that leaves your palette dry and you loins yearning for even a fleeting glimpse of Tori White's Tecate Treasures. The latter lack of bare breastage earns "Desert of Blood" a Blue Treehorn in my book. Don't waste your time.

Drunken Weekend Review Challenge

This weekend, Karl and I will be working together to both view and review some films for the ol' site here. We may even get around to 'shopping up some images of our new Treehorn awards.

I have issued the challenge to both of us to quickly review the films right from the couch as the credits roll. We may sacrifice some quality for quantity here, but hell... the site's been pretty slow recently.

Oh and we're drinking, too. Did I really need to clarify that? So don't expect expertly crafted metaphors or AFI quality critiques. The next few days will probably see the site populated with Mr. Skin-esque assessments. C'est la vie.

One Eyed Monster (2008)

From the Netflix synopsis:
“Stranded by a storm, the cast and crew of a porn flick fall prey to a vicious killer when Ron's (Jeremy) dismembered member is possessed by a bloodthirsty alien. Now they'll have to destroy the slithering monster before it spreads its deadly seed across the world.”

Now that sounds like a perfect Dudes of Horror movie, and the title suggests nothing less than 5 George potential. But sadly, as with most things which seem to be too good to be true, this movie disappoints on almost every level.

It starts with the typical horror movie setup, a bunch of people (porn movie crew) heading to a remote area (mountaintop lodge) that becomes even more isolated (snow storm, no cell phone reception), and introduction of a threat (Ron Jeremy’s detatched alien-possessed hog).

It progresses in typical fashion, the space wang killing each person as they become separated from the rest of the crew (The separate member killing each member separately?), and finishes in a final confrontation (death by Kegels).

So we have an interesting story, standard setup, but here is where the movie loses its footing. There is almost no blood in this movie. 8 people die by an E.T. dongmonster and there is nary a significant splatter to be found, of any bodily fluid for that matter. (Well OK, there is one dribble on a woman’s shoulder just before it attacks her from the rafters.)

I guess they either blew all their budget (shot their wad?) on their cast (all virtual unknowns, with the exceptions of porn icons Ron Jeremy, Veronica Hart, and character actor Charles Napier) or they just didn’t know any good effects people. There are a few effects (a few people get choked out by Ron’s shillelagh), but they are very few and far between. Charles Napier does have a pretty good monologue in the movie about his time in ‘Nam and a previous scrape with a killer schlong, so money well spent on him at least.

The other blatantly missing factor is flesh. In a horror movie which takes place at a remote porn set, all women in the movie should be naked multiple times. That is just a motherfuckin’ fact. OEM has one actress get nekkid. Once. By herself. Briefly.

This movie struck me as something that should have been made by Troma. This sort movie is very much in their purview (perv-view?). They could have supplied what this movie needed in buckets: gooey, gross, bloody, naked, and funny. Without that it stands as merely another example of wasted potential.

1 George and a Flaccid Treehorn