lady gah gah!

A wee break from all that Spanish stuff I've been posting - what can I say? I get easily distracted.

Purchased this yonks ago as part of a 4 film DVD release alongside Grotesque, The Velvet Vampire and Time Walker.

That'll teach me to shop whilst drunk.

Anyway the lovely folk at Nucleus Films are releasing a fully restored, cleaned up and uncut version of it this year so thought I'd give the old one a final watch before I bin it in favour of theirs*.

Fickle? Me?



Lady Frankenstein (AKA Madame Frankenstein / Daughter of Frankenstein / La Figlia di Frankenstein. 1971).
Dir: Mel Welles.
Cast: Rosalba Neri, Joseph Cotten, Paul Müller, Peter Whiteman, Herbert Fux, Mickey Hargitay, Marino Masé AND Renate Kasché.

"I've been up all night with my husband. He's resting now."

Somewhere in deepest, darkest Europe sometime in the 1870s (or it could be the 1970s by the look of the sideburns) a terrifying trio of ghoulish grave robbers led by the evil Kenny Lynch (the brilliantly monikered Herbert Fux) are busy delivering a dead body (obviously) to Baron Brian Frankenstein (a scarily pissed up Cotten wearing so much foundation that he's beginning to resemble an Issac Asimov trilogy) and his camply pube haired assistant Dr. Marshall Cavendish (Famed rice maker, star of Nightmare Castle and father of Robert, Müller) for the purpose of their nefarious experiments.

So far so clichéd.

Yet still very, very comfy.

Does he now?

But it's not all re-animated corpses and pulsating pop bottle tho' as it seems that the good doctors daughter Tania (council estate Rachel Weiss, Neri) is coming to stay after recently graduating from scientist school.

Greeted upon her arrival by the visually stunning yet mentally impaired handyman cum Poundshop Udo Kier Thomas (Contamination's Lt. Tony Aris himself Masé) whose job it is to look after the ickle aminals that the Baron uses for his transplant experiments, Tania heads to her room to get changed into a new more exotic outfit.

Something she will do between every scene.

Seriously hair continuity alone must have been a nightmare.

Anyway, it transpires that all this animal husbandry is, in fact, a cover for the real experiments and Tania soon reveals to her dad that she has always know about his plan to create a creature entirely from dead bodies and is eager to help.

The Baron begrudgingly agrees before heading off to a hanging to celebrate.

It seems a sexy man is to be executed for crimes against fashion and Frankenstein can't wait to get his hands on his body.

Meanwhile local police Captain, Harris Tweed (Jayne Mansfield's ex and father of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit star Mariska, Hargitay - see? who says this blog isn't in depth?), is paying a visit to Lynch's house in order to warn him that he knows he's a bad man and just in case we hadn't realised this ourselves the director helpfully shows him drunkenly pawing a prostitute as he defiantly tells Harris to sod off.

The overwhelming smell of chives was just too much for Leslie Dixon.

Back at the main plot and the locals are busy cheering and jeering as the prisoner is transported to the gallows and not wanting to be accused of being lax at his job Harris arrives in order to hassle Lynch (again) about the amount of empty graves in the cemetery as well as to ogle Tania whilst imagining ski-ing down her milky white cleavage.

Or was it the other way round?

As night draws in Lynch and co. successfully steal the bad mans body and sneak it over to the Baron who alongside Marshall  manages to pop its brain into an already constructed body - and thanks to a handy electrical storm - re-animate it.

Unfortunately the lightning causes the bandages to catch fire leaving the poor sod with boss-eyes and a head that looks like a half-chewed caramel penis (Whiteman in what was unfortunately his only film role outside those super 8's he made with your gran).

"Shite in mah mooth ya undead bastard!"

As Marshall heads off to the cellar to fetch some booze to celebrate the creature stiffly rises from the operating table and grabs the Baron and hugs him to death (no really) before stomping off into the woods as Tania watches in horror from behind the laundry basket.

The next day Tania and Marshall decide - for some reason that escapes me -  to contact Captain Harris to say that a robber broke into the house and killed the Baron before stealing his prize pottery pig collection.

Maybe they're gonna put an insurance claim in?

Using his detective powers Harris deduces that from Marshall's description the police should be looking for a seven foot giant in a ladies blouse and with a head like a novelty condom.

Which say what you like about this movie that at least gives it the edge over The Bill.

As this is a classic of European cinema it's not too long before the screen is filled with a wee bit of tasteful (female) nudity as the creature comes across (not in a gooey off-white mess way obviously) a fairly unattractive couple having sex by a river.

Squashing the mans head the beast nimbly picks up the lady before tossing her into the water only to be found later by two fishermen who the creature then proceeds to kill.

Which is nice.

Remember when your girlfriend said she was going camping with her pals?

As the bodies keep piling up Harris is left no alternative but to shout at everyone whilst angrily stomping about in a nice cape as all the characters we've come to know and love (Lynch and his grave robbing pals) and some we've never met before (a farmer and his - way too young - wife) are all butchered by the bald-headed beast.

Back at the castle there's something else stirring as Tania goads Marshall into admitting that he loves her and would like to have some of 'the sex' with her.

Being a typical attractive lady she responds by saying that she'd allow him to put it in her if he had better hair and was about 20 years younger (tell me about it, it's almost like the director was copying parts of my life) but not to worry as she's found a solution.

You see it seems that Tania thinks Thomas is a bit of alright so persuades Marshall to help her kill the handyman so she can them place his brain in the Thomas' young studly body.

Sounds legit.

Marshall agrees so Tania seduces Thomas before suffocating him at the moment of climax.

Which if I'm honest isn't that bad a way to go.

Everything is going swimmingly until Thomas' sister Julia (Kasché whom you may remember as Zenzi in Kurt Nachmann's 1970 classic Naughty Knickers) arrives looking for him.

Tania says that he's gone on holiday to recover from the Barons death but Julia doesn't trust her so heads over to see Harris and after a good bitching session both decide that Tania is guilty.

Of what tho' neither are sure but it looks like Harris may be in with the chance of a shag so to hell with evidence.
 

Your mums cum face....trust me I know and so does your uncle peter.

Working from her fathers research and some hastily scribble lipstick notes written on the back of an old tampon packet and with time against her, Tania somehow manages to successfully transplants Marshall's brain into Thomas' body with little or no trouble at all and as a bonus Marshall now possesses super strength and the ability to speak with both his own and Thomas' voice, which will probably come in handy when Harris turns up in a minute to ask him about the robbery and if in fact it was committed by a monster him and the Baron had made in the basement.

Your mum and dads wedding photo.

Meanwhile (it's always meanwhile) the creature/beast/oh go on then Frankenstein's monster has finally arrived in town and is busying himself smashing everyones plant pots much to the towns-folks chagrin leaving them with only one option....

Torch Frankenstein's castle!

Which seeing as they have absolutely fuck all evidence that anything has happened there.

If anything the whole (over) reaction is based on nothing more than Julia saying she doesn't like Tania because she wears too much make-up.

Chasing the creature to the castle it is confronted by an axe-wielding  Marshall/Thomas/Thomshall and the pair engage in an almost homoerotically charged fight that culminates with the creature getting its arm chopped off and Tania stabbing the pair of them with a sword.

Dollar have let themselves go....

Marshall/Thomas/Thomshall although seeming a wee bit peeved at this decides to forgive Tania for sticking something in him and the pair strip naked and indulge in a sweaty bout of sexy stuff as the castle burns around them.

As Harris vainly tries to get the villagers to leave the burning castle Julia notices the glistening spunk encrusted form of her brother entwined around Tania like a bright pink fleshy snake violently thrusting his manroot into her freshly trimmed lady garden as an inferno rages around them, shouting his name she watches in horror (and it must be said slight arousal - or was that me?) as Marshall/Thomas/Thomshall slowly and methodically chokes Tania as the pair are engulfed by the flames.....

Although released in 1971, clinical psychologist, radio DJ, actor, writer and film director Mel Welles' Lady Frankenstein harks back to a simpler age coming across as a throwback to Roger Corman's 60s Poe output gleefully mixed with all the nudity and horror you'd expect from a Hammer film via the look of the best (and sometimes worst) Eurotrash classics of the time.

And that's no bad thing.

Whilst the plot - save for the slightly ahead of its time theme of female empowerment that was most likely accidental - is no great shakes and the make-up and effects border on the poundshop side of Halloween it's the performances that make the movie with Rosalba Neri** (credited here as Sara Bay) epitomizing everything we've come to know and love with regards to EuroHorror starlets.

Dusky, raven haired and with a touch of saucy sadomasochistic menace she dominates every scene (and every wardrobe change) in the movie and is worth the price of admission alone, the only person that comes close to matching her is the great Paul Müller, all crap-hair and poppy eyes coming across for all the world like a slightly fey, crack addled ferret/man hybrid made flesh.

Rosalba Neri- You would, I would, your granddad did. Twice.

  

 To be honest tho' it's a good job that the pair are so good as everyone else involved appears to be either drunk or sleeping - or in Joseph Cotten's case both - whilst rent-a-lunk Mickey Hargitay bravely stumbles about as if he's in a community centre production of Columbo where the entire cast has been dressed in market stall Elvis hand-me-downs whilst the sensational Herbert Fux makes us wonder why he didn't become a movie mega star or at the very least got to appear in panto, it takes a brave man to pull of skin-tight beige leggings and still look tough.

And if all that's not enough to convince you name another film where the supporting cast are so flimsy that you begin to notice the actors headwear?

Seriously at about the 30 minutes mark I realised that quite a few of the cast were sharing a green trilby, go watch it - it's true.

We then played a game of counting how many times and on how many different heads it appeared.

You try it too and write in with your results, there's a prize for the winner.

"I can see your house from here Peter!"

Despite - or because - of all that Lady Frankenstein is still a fantastically entertaining movie, at once a work of erotic genius with an added taste of nightmarish medical drama draped in comfy gothic trappings that are juxtaposed by an air of overall shoddiness that somehow adds to its charm and went some way to explaining why it became the biggest money-making female-based Frankenstein movie released in 1971.

Pre-order that BluRay now.





















*Plus I'm hoping they used my artwork for it, cos it's rather good even if I say so myself.






**If you're interested in seeing more of her work may I recommend Ottavio Alessi's 1969 erotic thriller Top Sensation that not only features Ms Neri playing a bikini-clad nympho but also stars Edwige Fenech as a pervy prostitute.

You can thank me later.

childline.

Going away to Spain with the Cassman and his class next week so thought it'd be good to get him up to date with some quality Spain-based cinema before we go.

See? 

This is parenting done right.

Quien Puede A Un Nino? (AKA Death Is Child's Play, The Killer's Playground, Island of the Damned, Who Can Kill a Child?, Would You Kill a Child? 1976)
Dir: Narciso Ibanez Serrador.
Cast: Lewis Fiander, Prunella Ransome, Antonio Iranzo and the cast of Byker Grove.

  "Do you think the other children will start playing the way we do?"

"Oh, yes...there are lots of children in the world. Lots of them."

A pair of  particularly posh English love birds, the mightily mustached Tom and the pountily pregnant poppet Evelyn (Doctor Who's drug dealing tinker Tryst from The Nightmare of Eden Lewis Fiander and victim of the Silurian plague Prunella Ransome) are enjoying a well deserved break from drinking Pimms, watching cricket and abusing the cleaner with a holiday in sunny Spain, taking in the local lifestyle (letting your hair get greasy, not washing, seducing underage girls etc - possibly) and traveling to various festivals buying carpets and the like.

Whilst ordering food in English and sniggering at the locals trousers like all Brits abroad obviously.

After much saucy fun, bikini clad frolicking, vast amounts of el cheapo Vino and a fairly serious chat about abortion (Tom wanted Evelyn to have one, she refused - see it's a kinda child killing thing isn't it? I see what they did there), Tom decides to finish the holiday with a visit to the beautiful island of Almanzora (these days frequented by such luminaries as Ian Botham and Daley Thompson fact fans) and the small village of Shi'moo where he had many a magical holiday as a small (non mustached) boy.

Hmmm...another child reference. 

This Serrador bloke is good.

But the couple get a shock when they arrive as the town is abandoned, the hotel is empty and the local restaurant is deserted. 

Worst of all tho' is that all the TeeVee's are broken and the corner shop is out of Take A Break magazines.
 
What has happened to this island paradise?

"Look! It's Fred Titmuss!"

Tom, being a hunky hero type  decides to play detective whilst  Evelyn, being in the fat lady pudding club, rests her swollen feet.

No sooner has Tom jauntily skipped down the road than a young girl pops up at a window and waves merrily at Evelyn before slowly creeping over and obsessively stroking our plump pals mummy tummy before smiling and running away.

Weird.

Returning to Evelyn empty handed save for a kiss me quick hat the pair - in a horror movie first - decide to explore together, soon coming across an old man sitting at the roadside.

I suppose that being heavily pregnant has put Evelyn off the sex so Tom has to get his jollies where he can.
 
But before the old fella can wipe himself down or even grunt "Aye son!" a small girl appears from nowhere and bludgeons him to death with his walking stick.
 
Kids eh?

Luckily the local kids fear the Bri-Nylon.

Finding the situation a wee bit strange and probably worthy of a bit of Scooby Doo style investigation Tom and Evelyn decide to follow the girl further inland, passing deserted cars, discarded teeth and many a battered skull along the way.

All belonging to adults.

Well obviously the cars belong to adults (they aren't toy ones) but I'm trying to build tension so stick with me.

It's not long before our dynamic duo have uncovered the terrifying - if fairly obvious - truth behind the killings....the children have become possessed by mentalism, murdering all the adults on the island.

To death!

Front bum, back bum, shitey mooth....three for a full hoose!

After school activities on Almanzora now include using dead peoples as piñatas, not brushing your teeth, skewering tourists and staying up all night to play Call of Duty on the PS4 whilst listening to Pixie Lott or something.

Yes, it's every adults nightmare.

Pixie Lott: Tunnel or funnel?

Tom and Evelyn, obviously au fait with the killer kiddies genre, decide it'd probably be for the best if they attempted to escape from these wannabe ASBO's by making their way to the up-market bit of town which - luckily - is populated by posh ex-pats (with even posher kids obviously), none of this council scum they keep finding around the streets where they are now.

See? 

Even more of that socio-political stuff, the director's a genius.

Just when everything seems like it's going to be OK (isn't that the way?) Tom makes a disturbing discovery, it appears that it only takes a sly look from those perishing pre-teens in the general direction of another child to pass of the madly murderous mentalism.

Tom and Evelyn are left with no choice but to fight back, the fate of their unborn child in their hands.

Well in Evelyn's tummy but you know what I'm getting at.

Pedants.

Begging for a mooth shite-in.

Unfortunately Tom's idea of fighting back is to lock himself and his wife in someones spare room and hope they can stay quiet enough to not attract any attention till the police turn up.

Which as far as escape plans go is up their with "Let's split up and search the woods for a way out alone!"

Hal Delrich would be proud.

Settling down for a well deserved rest (and maybe, just maybe a quick fondle of Evelyn's glorious globes) Tom's top seduction technique ("Oooh Evelyn I've got a pure steamer on!" probably) is interrupted when a blond small boy brandishing his large weapon bursts in on them.

Tom jumps into action, bitch-slapping the little shite before reluctantly shooting him in the arse, giving us a chance to not only see Fiander's Oscar calibre grief acting but to answer the question poised by the film's title.

This is getting all meta-textual init?

But this tearful wank and Pot Noodle moment brings only a brief period of calm for our cooped up couple as, without warning Evelyn starts leaking piss, shit and shame as her by now infected foetus murders her from within the womb.

Which I'll admit I didn't see coming.

As the sun rises on a new day, a weary Tom is left completely alone. 

Apart from a handy assault rifle that is.

And an obvious dislike of children.

Especially mental foreign ones.

A wee bit like all those folk who voted Brexit.

Shallow: Hal.

Violently grabbing the rifle, Tom decides (albeit a bit late in the day) to prove his worth as a  real man by running down to the harbour whilst firing indiscriminately into the crowds of kids and steal a boat back to the mainland.

Cue primal screams and comedy kid dancing as the bullets rip thru' row upon row of mad mini-people as Tom gingerly runs down the street before finally managing to cut the boat loose and head toward the open sea.

Wading into the water in an attempt to stop him leaving the children try desperately to overturn the boat as Tom valiantly tries to maim as many of them as he can.

Unfortunately (for him) Tom's world recording breaking infanticide attempt is cut short by the arrival of a Spanish police patrol boat, and the greasy crew mistakenly thinking that Tom has gone mad, shoot the poor sod dead.

Docking at the harbour, the officers begin tending to the wounded and asking the poor ickle children where their parents are.

One of the kids points toward town whilst the officer in charge asks no-one in particular the age old question "Who Can Kill a Child?"
 

Which is a wee bit silly seeing as the answer is the guy he just shot obviously.

As the three officers begin the short walk to the shops (it's thirsty work killing tourists) one of them notices a small group of children sharing out the guns on the boat, turning to stop them the trio are confronted by a small moonfaced girl who waves them Goodbye just before one of the boys shoots the three dead.

As the sun begins to set the children split into small groups, all the easier to infiltrate the mainland...

Murphy's Mob: the ASBO years.

The bastard offspring of Village of The Damned and daddy to every kiddie based horror flick since (and no doubt where Stephen King ripped Children of The Corn off from), from it's opening montage of true life atrocities committed against children to it's downbeat ending Who Can Kill a Child? is as disturbing a movie today as it was at the time of release.

Thinking about it in these child safety obsessed modern times tho' it probably comes across as even more so.

Which makes the fact that a remake not only got green-lit but actually made even more disturbing.

But it's not just  the subject matter - or the haircuts - that makes this film an unforgettable and fairly harrowing experience.


No it's more to do with the leisurely pace at which Narciso Ibanez Serrador unfolds his story, unafraid as he is to build the tension slowly as he works quietly toward the movie's climax with an ever growing sense of dread. 

Filmed completely in broad daylight, Pedro Almodóvar's cinematographer of choice, Jose Luis Alcaine adds a sense of growing isolation whilst avant-garde composer Waldo de los Ríos' soundtrack of suitably soothing lullaby style songs gives a spooky Twilight Zone vibe to the proceedings.

But that's not all it has in it's favour, the small (in number as well as height) cast are unusually good for Spanish genre flicks of the time (casting English speaking ex-Doctor Who actors probably helped) and the Kiddie cast admirably pull of the task of going from sweet to shit scary in the bat of an eyelid.

A wee bit like my own podlings then.

Finally getting the love and care it deserves after years of being butchered, redubbed, retitled and generally pissed about,  Serrador's masterpiece can now proudly take it's place as the missing link between the horrific excesses of Jorge Grau's Manchester Morgue and the Paul Naschy's Werewolf series.


Well we all know how much I like my little boxes, plus it makes it easier to put on your shelves this way.

lordi lordi hellelujah.

Bizarre as it seems I've recently discovered that, even tho' I rant and rave about it at every opportunity, I've never actually reviewed this movie here.

Which is odd because frankly it's brilliant and quite possibly THE best Autism-based horror movie featuring former Eurovision winners ever made.

So seeing as it's actually Eurovision weekend I'm going to remedy that.

Enjoy.


Dark Floors (2008).
Dir:  Pete Riski.
Cast: William Hope, Leon Herbert, Philip Bretherton, Ronald Pickup, Noah Huntley, Dominique McElligott, Skye Bennett and the mighty Lordi.

There is only one Hell.

It's a dark and stormy night at Baldpate Hospital where the spookily Autistic - or is that Autistically spooky? - Sarah (Bennett - Steven Seagal's daughter from Shadowman and the voices of Pyra / Mythra in the hit game Xenoblade Chronicles 2) is undergoing an MRI scan to cure her obsession with red crayons or something.

Look it's all very complicated and I'm not a real doctor.

Unfortunately the storm causes the machine to short circuit and burst into flames much to the doctors - and it must be said her dad Bens (former Emmerdale hunk Huntley) dismay.

Between the electrical fires and the idea that you can cure Autism with an MRI scan (plus the fact that the hospital is greasier than your Uncle Pablo's trousers) Ben decides to take Sarah home only to be informed by caring sharing nurse Emily (McElligott from House of Cards) that they thought it'd be a laugh to start the wee girl on some experimental epilepsy drugs (without his consent obviously) and that to take her home without them may kill her.

As a plus point they do point out that her liver is OK so swings and roundabouts really.

At this point I was getting a little upset, not at the way that Sarah was being treated but by the fact that no-one ever offered me any drugs after my diagnosis, all I got was this badge:

Tight NHS bastards.

Thinking it over for a few minutes Ben decides to fuck the drugs and attempt to sneak her out of the hospital in the middle of the night, cunningly disguising her Autism by placing her in a wheelchair so folk will think she's got a club foot instead.

Genius.

Surprisingly the plans seems to work, until they reach the (packed) elevator that is when - as they bump over the edge of the door to enter - Sarah drops her crayons.

Rushing to leave Ben grabs them off the (dark) floor and thrusts them back into her hands not realising that he's inadvertently mixed the reds in with the blues.

And the yellow.

Which as we're all aware is the Autistic equivalent of someone shitting in your favourite teacup.

Noticing the error Sarah can do nothing but scream in dismay and as we all know if an Autistic scream* is left unchecked it can open a portal to a scary netherworld of fear and terror which is kinda annoying for the other folk - smarmy briefcase wanker Jon (Aliens Gorman himself Hope), creepy tramp Tobias (Pickup from loads of stuff) and stoic security guard Rick (Herbert channeling every Ving Rhames horror performance ever) - in the lift when the doors open out onto a bloodstained, spunk covered corridor of doom.

 .

"Excuse me....do you require any scissors sharpening?"

As our - not so - merry band nervously edge their way out of the lift they soon discover that they seem to still be in the hospital only a darker more nightmarish version of it, which for anyone who's ever been stuck in A and E on a Saturday night will realise must be fucking terrifying.

They soon come across (not in that way) Emily who's been passing the time since the space/time slip popping paper towels over the faces of dead pensioners and who - in a scene of total jobsworthness - begins to lay into Ben for attempting to sneak Sarah out of the hospital.

 Remembering that he has a child with him Ben plays the dutiful dad and goes to see if she's alright (as opposed to alt. right obviously) only to find that she's too busy drawing all manner of scary creatures to notice what's going on.

Hopefully she's not drawing the beings that occupy this dimension seeing as she appears to be linked to it.

Nah, it'll never happen.

Atomic Kitten have let themselves go....

The group really don't have time to ever think about such things tho' as they're suddenly attacked by a spooky ghost woman which gives Jon an excuse to quickly fuck off back to the elevator leaving the others to indulge in a wee bit of what looks like drunk dad dancing as they try to dodge the imaginary spectre that will be no doubt added on later at great expense.

Entering the lift (in a violent manner usually reserved for your dad after a few drinks) Jon frantically presses the buttons in the hope of escaping this waking nightmare only to hear a sinister scratching at behind the floor panels....

Escaping the ghost and locking themselves in a supply room is enough to wake Tobias from his drunken stupor and give him an opportunity to explain the films plot.
It seems that Sarah is indeed linked to the strange happenings around them and that the only way to return home is to kill the child.

And we thought the whole MMR debacle was bad news for Autistic folk, this guy makes Andrew Wakefield look positively sane by comparison.

Tho' I must say that at this point anyone who actually believes the whole Autism/vaccines bollocks deserves a fucking good kicking.

Rant over.

Laugh now!

 Thinking it over for a few minutes Ben realises that not only would this course of action not go down too well with Sarah's mum (even tho' she's dead) but more importantly would probably stop him scoring with Emily so he decides to call Tobias an arse before heading off to find the hospital exit.

But something is hunting our heroes, hungry for fresh souls.....

Yup, Lordi are coming....

The brainchild of singer/songwriter Mr Geoff Lordi (AKA the Scrabble high scoring Tomi Petteri Putaansuu) as a new outlet for his shock-rock combo Lordi, Dark Floors holds not only the distinction of being one of the most expensive films made in Finland but also of being quite possibly the best Silent Hill adaptation ever made that's not actually a Silent Hill film.

Oh yeah and it features an Autistic lead so really what's not to love?

Well your sister if I'm honest but let's not go there.

Formed in 1992 the group had always experimented with horror imagery and by 2004 had already completed a short movie - The Kin - a Lovecraftian tale that follows a young writer who after losing her mother in a train wreck finds the creatures from a horror book she is writing (all played by members of the band) become flesh bending time and space to ensure the tome is published.

With the short establishing the band members/creatures origins it was only a matter of time before they would make the leap to the bigscreen and after winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 2006 the world stage beckoned.

And by world stage I mean cinema screens obviously.

World stage is just a phrase.

Kin Hell!

Surprisingly tho' given the bands appearance and musical influences this is no KISS style romp but a straight-laced, old fashioned horror movie with a dependable cast playing it straight down the line and whilst not as gruesome as it wants to be it still packs some genuine chills.

True the plot makes fuck all sense and indeed the science on show is a wee bit dodgy but you can't help but get dragged in by Mr Lordi - and director Pete Riski's - obvious love of the horror genre.

Dr Andrew Wakefield desperately tries to convince a young mum that shooting yourself in the head cures Autism....(If only he'd done this....sigh).

Worth a look if you're a fan of hospitals, Autism and/or orthopedic shoes (and let's be honest you wouldn't be here if you weren't) Dark Floors is a perfect Friday night moviethat whilst not re-inventing the genre does provide some (sensible) chuckles and a couple of nice scares along the way.

And yes I know the ending makes fuck all sense but they're foreign so what do you expect?












































*Which is why all my kids are ball-gagged.

As am I.

And that's why I blog rather than do a podcast.

And now you know.

fog on the rhine.

After rewatching The Vampires Night Orgy recently I've found myself obsessing over the sublime Helga Liné.

Which is nice.

And, I may add a good enough excuse to revisit....

Las garras de Lorelei (AKA L'abbraccio mortale di Lorele, The Loreley's Grasp, The Night the Screaming Stopped. 1974).
Dir: Amando de Ossorio
Cast: Tony Kendall, Helga Liné, Silvia Tortosa, Ángel Menéndez, Josefina Jartin, Loreta Tovar, José Thelman, Luis Induni, Betsabé Ruiz and Francisco Nieto.

“Send her back into the legendary night from which she has come.”

Welcome to the small town of Cleftplate nestling on the banks of the river Rhine, a town where nylon action slacks and porn mustaches rule supreme and where a green-gilled beast is doing it's best to eat thru' the entire neighbourhood in it's search for fresh hearts.

Beats Emmerdale any day.

But not The Archers obviously.

Every night dozens of angry, polyester-clad villagers gather at the local pub to debate who or what is terrorizing the town.

Luckily there's an expert in their midst, the local doctor, one Terry Von Lander (Der Todesrächer von Soho star Menéndez) and according to him the town is being stalked by a mythical beast.

Sounds plausible.

The Cleftplate men's club annual game of spin the bottle was always popular with the Colonel.

It transpires (I love that word it's second only to ottoman) that many years ago a beautiful lady, named Lorelei who spurned by her lover after he tricked her into a bout of the bum sex, tossed herself off the cliffs and into the murky waters of the Rhine.

As you would.

Well ever since then it is said that she returns every number of years (he's not that specific) in order to feast on human flesh for some convoluted reason.

I must have missed that bit.

Anyway fearing for the safety of the pupils at the local all girls boarding school, the sternly saucy headmistress Elke Ackerman (top tottie Tortosa from Horror Express) hires local he-man and open shirted sex god Sigurd (Italy's very own John Leslie, Kendall, most famous for his role as PI Jo Louis Walker in the Kommissar X movies) to patrol the grounds in the hope of keeping the pupils safe.

Frankly if I had to choose between a fishy monster or Sigurd's obscenely large bulge I know which I'd probably need more protection from, it's almost as if he has a babies arm down there.

A baby bodybuilders arm.

A baby bodybuilders arm holding an apple.

A really, really big apple.

With one huge weeping eye.

Arriving the following day astride a huge motorbike, Sigurd and his trousers cause quite a stir (and a hell of a lot of dampness) amongst the students as well as a feeling of complete loathing from Elke.

I doth think she protests too much but let's wait and see.

You would, he would, your mum did. Twice.

Patrolling the grounds every night with his massive weapon cocked and ready to fire, our he-man hero alleviates the boredom by leering and winking at the girls whilst they get ready for bed.

And being dolly burds they fahkin' love it.

Obviously.

Unfortunately (or fortunately if you prefer stalking barely legal girls to killing monsters) the beast appears to be more interested in killing the townsfolk.

Which, if I'm honest doesn't seem to bother anyone until the creature murders the local homeless musician cum rent boy Tobias that is.

With no-one left to cuddle up to on those cold winters nights when their wives have locked them out, a mob of the towns most mustachioed men march on the mayor's cottage and demand action.

Back at the school shifty Sigurd is having some trouble of his own after being caught masturbating in the pupil's private pool.

Ms. Elke, still not swayed by his manliness, sends our hero off into the countryside for a swim in a nearby lake in the vain hope of cooling his ardor.

"Ere! Can you smell Mackerel?"

Wandering around like a lost child (albeit a lost child with a massive hard-on), Sigurd comes across (I'm not even going to type it) a ravishing redhead in a green fringed bikini lounging nonchalantly on a rock trying her best not to appear too cold.

Having not seen a female for nearly fifteen minutes Sigurd gives chase but the mysterious woman gracefully glides thru' the rocks, her ample arse gently bouncing hypnotically as she goes before disappearing from sight. 

Bewitched by this ginger siren Sigurd begins to hang around the lake on a daily basis in the hope of seeing her again and luckily (with the movie only being ninety odd minutes) this happens fairly quickly.

But not as quickly as Sigurd's smooth moves seeing as within minutes he manages to get his mysterious Ms. into a saucy clinch on a dirty mattress in a broken down fisherman’s hut.

The romantic devil.

Unfortunately (for him and us tho' I reckon the lady had a narrow escape) just at the point of entry a big bearded man appears and reprimands Sigurd for keeping Lorelei out for so long.

But wait, isn't Lorelei the name of the flesh-feasting beast?

Sigurd thinks for a moment before remembering that one Lorelei is a big green monster whilst the other is a curvaceous sex kitten played by Berlin born Liné, from the equally fantastic La orgía nocturna de los vampiros.

Without another word beardy scoops her up into his muscled, well oiled arms and proceeds to walk straight into the lake.

Sigurd is intrigued to say the least.

"Hey Senorita! How'd you fancy coming in the back o' me car and letting me shite in your mooth?"

Dazed, confused and still aroused Sigurd is wandering aimlessly thru the woods when he discovers a shifty Von Lander skulking in the bushes during what appears to be an impromptu dogging session.

The doctor, however, obviously horrified at the thought of being outed as a sex fiend begins to confuse Sigurd with his utter bollocks theories.

You know the type of thing; much mention of the moons rays, waffle regarding photochemical stuff and theories on the molecular structure of things.

And to prove all these theories and how on earth they relate to the monster he invites Sigurd back to his Victorian style knocking shop cum laboratory where he makes a severed human hand grow green and scaly.

He's even created a radioactive steak knife in case he gets close enough to stab the creature.

Or for if he ever has a radioactive steak obviously.

Sigurd is impressed.

Unfortunately before a town meeting can be called Von Lander is violently murdered (is there any other kind?) by Lorelei and his lab burnt to the ground.

Every cloud has a silver lining however (except mushroom clouds, their linings are Strontium 90 based) as this only increases Sigurd's acceptance of the idea that his new squeeze Lorelei could in fact be the same Lorelei that's killing everyone.

Thinking the whole situation over for several seconds he decides that even tho' she can be a wee bit grumpy, Elke is probably better sex material and so heads off to the beach wearing his tiniest shorts and carrying a big bomb.

Insert cock here.

Persuading a local fisherman to take him out onto the lake, our horny hero plunges into the waters just below the infamous rocks from where Lorelei originally jumped and soon discovers an ancient underwater cavern festooned with jewels, gold and bikini clad ladies.

Which is nice.

But for once Sigurd is not to be distracted by such things, he's here on a mission, not only to blow the place to Govan and back but to also inform Lorelei that he's breaking up with her due in part to her habit of eating people but mainly cos she stinks of herring.

What a guy.

Jeremy Beadle: The Revenge.

After a few minutes of inconsequential dialogue and slow fighting Sigurd manages to fight off the bikini girls advances and set the charges before swimming to safety and leaving poor Lorelei to die under a collapsing hill.

Or did she?

Back on the mainland Elke is enjoying a midnight walk around the grounds when she hears a rustling in the bushes followed by the faint aroma of fish...

Lorelei is alive and well and out for revenge on Sigurd's 'other woman', jumping out from behind a tree and indulging in a spot of girl on fish wrestling.

Which frankly isn't as exciting as it sounds.

Luckily Sigurd arrives in the nick of time and plunges his radioactive blade into Lorlelei who then, not too surprisingly dies as the lovers gaze into each others eyes.

Aww, how sweet.

Yup, someone was paid for designing this.

Not only taking liberties with the Lorelei myth but kinda taking the piss a wee bit too, Blind Dead creator Amando de Ossorio takes the traditional tale of a beautiful siren who lures sailors to their deaths by enticing them into the rocky cliffs of the River Rhine and crafts it into one of the most terrifying monster movies ever made.

By that I mean one of the most terrifying monster movies ever made by someone named deOssorio and titled Las garras de Lorelei obviously.

Glad that's out of the way.

The real Lorelei yesterday. Well a dramatic (and incredibly hot) statue of her anyway. Here's hoping it's wipe clean.

Although never hitting the heights of The Blind Dead, Las garras de Loreleiis a near perfect blend of tight storytelling, great locations, seventies breasted woman, shoddy gore and frankly bonkers characterization all mixed in with some fantastic Carry On style sauciness and topped off with a career best performance from Tony Kendall's trousers.


A must see for any self respecting fan of fish-based romantic horror or just those who enjoy staring at a (very) well endowed man for an hour and a half.

Perfection.

potato!

Woke up this morning to the news that I've got to redraw a few panels of a strip I'm working on....oh and that director Umberto Lenzi had died.

And what better way to celebrate than by dedicating todays 31 days of horror to what his possibly his greatest film.

It was then I realized that I'd lent out my copy of Gatti rossi in un labirinto di vetro so it'll have to be this instead*.
Enjoy.

Nightmare City (AKA City of the Walking Dead, La Invasión De Los Zombies Atómicos, 1980).
Dir: Umberto Lenzi.
Cast: Hugo Stiglitz, Laura Trotter, Francisco Rabal, Mel Ferrer, some bouncy breasts and a few other body parts usually attached to people.

In a nameless city somewhere in 'Europe' (tho' from the state of the haircuts and trousers it looks like the West Midlands circa 1985) a terrible nuclear accident has sent the populace reeling into panic.

Bouffanted and bearded ace reporter Dean Miller (Stiglitz from Alcoholics Anonymous and that film where the boat capsizes and they eat the dog) is assigned to interview eminent scientist Otto Hagenbach (bless you) who just happens to be flying in from the accident site that very morning.

Lucky eh?

But when the plane arrives it contains not only the grey haired boffin but a cargo hold full of scum-faced tramps dressed in their grandad's old suits.

Sorry, I mean bloodthirsty, potato faced 'atomic zombies'.

'Atomic zombies' intent on murder!!

And a fair bit of tittie touching if the rest of the film is anything to go by.

"You chase me now!"

Whilst all this scary shite is going down (as you kids say) Mrs. Miller (Trotter from Only Fools and Horses) is busy making her rounds at the local hospital.

Don't worry, she works there. It's not like she's skulking about chasing ambulances.

But things are a mite strange there too as she realizes when visiting a young patient named Phil.

When our bubble haired heroine, trying to pass the time, innocently asks him "Well, how are you feeling today?"

His frankly worrying reply is "I feel like somebody who's waiting for the hatchet guy to chop off his head, doctor."

Which is nice, if delivered a little stiffly.

To make matters spookier, another patient, this time a broken legged football loving wee boy, has been having nightmares about bad men cutting his leg off.

Could this be related?

Mel (not Kim).

Well there's no time to worry about such trivialities as meanwhile at a top secret army base, military top brass Major Holmes (Rabal, all rugged with a silver quiff and a sexy sculptress girlfriend young enough to be his granddaughters fetus) and General Murchinson (Mel "I was married to Audrey Hepburn and the alimony bill is forcing me to appear in utter shite for the remainder of my career" Ferrer) are discussing the breaking emergency.

Please join us for a fantastic piece of choice dialogue as the body of one of the attackers is being examined :

Murchison (obviously reading from cue cards): Your autopsy categorically excludes an extraterrestrial being. It's molecular structure clearly establishes him as a member of the human race. A paradox when you consider what they've been doing....

Donohue (a 'scientist'): The examination of the various tissue samples that we have taken from the body reveal a high level of radioactivity, far superior to the level normally tolerated by the human organism. In addition we have found more or less recent hyper-tissue regeneration.

Murchison (bored now): Can you make that a little simpler Colonel? Some of your colleagues may not have the same technical or theoretical background...

(what? a technical background in talking bollocks? does that exist?)

Donohue (he's making it up now): In other words this individual and others like him have been subjected to strong doses of atomic radiation which increase their physical capacities beyond the norm.

Holmes (in a way only a man of a certain age can): How far beyond the norm?

Donohue (he's on a roll!): It's impossible to say. But it is a fact that these cells, subjected to almost every treatment we know, have proven to be almost indestructible.

Holmes: In short it's a kind of superman…?

Donohue (very excitedly): Much more than that… the victims of these creatures are contaminated even if they only suffer minor injuries.....

Murchison (losing the will to live): Then they can reproduce themselves… say indefinitely?

Donohue (jumping up and down waving his hands like a loon): That more or less… is correct!

I'm not saying the dialogue is bad but my computer kept crashing in an attempt to stop me typing it.

Look at it....really LOOK AT IT, it's so banal that if you concentrate hard enough the words actually appear to melt into mush before seeping into your eyes and attempting to rot your brain.

And the whole fucking film is written in this 'style'.

It's like the celluloid equivalent of a prison buggery.

Minus the biting obviously.

People died for this.

Possibly.

Anyway, still with us?

Good because after this fantastically written exchange Murchison elects to put plan 'H' into effect (no idea what's wrong with A thru' G), giving his men the unforgettable order to "Aim for the brain".

The race is now on to save humanity.

And enough cash to get Stiglitz some cheap wine after shooting finishes.

Mr. Potato Head need love!

Can Dean persuade the station heads (and their bodies too) to cancel the pop hits and bouncy tits TV show 'Dance Party' and broadcast his warning to the city and still have time to rescue his wife?

Will Sheila the sculptor survive in the coal bunker?

Will Mrs. Miller (not the cult recording star, the doctor remember?) ever stop waxing philosophically about the situation or will Dean just slap her (and slap her and slap her) until she starts crying in the horrific realization that she's surround by a cast and crew of highly disturbed sociopaths and alcoholics whose only concerns are keeping their star sober and filling the screen with as many inopportune breast shots as possible?

But most importantly will the once great Mel Ferrer have to spend his twilight years in the hell that is the Italian 'B' movie industry?

"Touch my hairy face!"

Director Umberto Lenzi's warning against the dangers of science gone mad was (according to the great man himself) based on 'true events'.

That's right! Lenzi reckons this really happened and is actually proud of this film, hailing it his 'masterpiece' comparing it's plot to that of Jonathan Demme's Philadelphia for it's portrayal of the effects disease has on the populace.

The joke was on us, we thought we were watching a cheap and cheerful zombie movie, when Lenzi has actually produced an amazingly existential docudrama that could change lives and save our planet.

His off screen battles to complete his vision are well documented, from producer Luis Mendez refusing to let him cast a 'name' actor in the lead role of Dean Miller (Lenzi favoured either Franco Nero or Fabio Testi whereas Mendez insisted on a Mexican lead to appeal to the movies co-funders who eventually cast alleged lush and professional hairy woodsman Stiglitz) to what appears to be an imaginary 'female executive' forcing him to tone down the films many gore scenes.

"Oi Umberto! NO!"

Unfortunately (for Lenzi), by his usual cinematic standards the finished film is in fact utter shite.

But for us it's one of the greatest pieces of art ever produced.

Just ask Robert Rodriguez, he allegedly based his Planet Terror on this movie and we know how great that is.

From the moment the film begins echoes of Waiting for Godot reverberate around the whole production as the imagination of the director crashes headlong into the crushing reality of the films budget with Hagenbach's arrival  celebrated by covering the screen with a crimson hue only a cheap blood substitute can supply and characters just hang around, unable to do anything but await their final indignant ends.

The rampaging 'atomic zombies' are a triumph of crap over cash, looking for all the world as if their heads have been covered in PVA glue and then dipped in a bowl of potato peelings mixed with a liberal amount of dried shite and burrowing below the surface like some sleeping beast Lenzi's latent misogynism regularly bursts forth onto the screen as female character after female character are forced to trip over, whimper and lose their tops before being killed in a variety of increasingly sexualized scenes.

Fair play to the writers tho' who even when faced with the plot screaming to a halt halfway thru' bravely carry on by having Stiglitz and Trotter run aimlessly around the countryside with no other purpose than to occasionally bump into a group of infected killers then run away again.

But not before Trotter has been given (another) bloody good slap obviously.

It's like a horror version of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead but with more arse shots.

Trotter (a doctor don't forget) persuades the hairy one that a church is the best place to hide because the virus/plague/whatever won't enter the house of God.....Much to her (but not the audiences) surprise the church is full of spud-faced loons out for blood.

 

Mulder and Scully: the pikey years.

Exciting subplots include General Merchinson trying to get his daughter to the (relative) safety of the base whilst she'd rather go camping with her fella and the silver fox that is Major Holmes attempting to save his (almost pre-teen) girlfriend.

If I'm honest then the sight of the mahogany tanned and leathery faced Francisco Rabal running his tongue over the chest of someone young enough to be his (grand) daughter is probably the most unsettling and nightmarish thing in the whole movie meaning this image (and the sight of him in a scoop-necked too tight green 'army' t-shirt proudly displaying his curvy man-breasts) will stay with you long after the film has ended.

A leathery man yesterday.

And oh boy what an ending.

After everyone else seems to have died, the Millers escaped to a seemingly deserted fairground.

Suddenly they are surrounded by the infected....Dean and Anna head for safety atop a rollercoaster (?) the bad men in hot pursuit.

A helicopter appears on the horizon lowering a ladder the pair climb to safety, only for Mrs. Miller to lose her grip (on the ladder, not reality) and plummet to her death in a kind of floppy way only a shoddily made dummy can.

Dean screams and suddenly.....

Like I'd spoil it for you.

You'll just haveta go out and buy it.

And I know you want to even if you don't you filthy whores.




































*As an aside a shorter (and considerably less childish) version of this review will be appearing in the official Weekend of The Dead convention programme this year alongside a few more quality zombie classics featured in The Undeck of which copies are still available here.

If you're attending feel free to say "Hi!" or even buy me a pint - I'm not too proud to say no.