Specters (1987)

Time for some Italian eighties horror that I’ve not seen before. The movie opens with some workers using a large boring machine to extend a subway tunnel. The vibration disturbs a nearby archaeological site which uncovers a hidden tomb beneath the ruins. This excites the leader of the expedition, Professor Lasky, who declares it as the mysterious pagan site they have been looking for. It predates even the Christian catacombs nearby. This all seems fine… right?

Well after meeting Alice, an actress working on a horror movie nearby, and her boyfriend Marcus, who works for Lasky, we then see something is wrong. There is some evil force that rises from beneath the ground terrorizing the locals. What is it and why does it start to kill? In a bit of a dialogue dump from Lasky we find out that the pagan site was a place where sacrifices were made to an ancient god of evil. So I’m figuring it is that guy getting up to bad stuff now that he has been released/disturbed. More bodies pile up, Alice is kidnapped by the god of evil, and Marcus saves the day by blowing up the site and rescuing Alice. Though it may not come as a surprise when someone tags along on their honeymoon… oh yeah I forgot to mention after saving her Marcus proposes to Alice because that is what you do in a horror flick.

Okay that sounded snarky, but I actually had fun with Specters. I mean the plot doesn’t make a ton of sense as this is your typical Italian horror movie leaning into stylistic visuals and sound design rather than a cohesive plot. Think Argento’s non Gialli efforts and some of Bava’s more esoteric movies, though I’d never say Specters is on that level. Those are the gold standard, but I’d say this one is a solid second tier example beneath them. I only mention those filmmakers as an easy comparison to let you know what you are in for if you sit down with this one. And to circle back around to the beginning there is a basic plot to follow. Dig a hole, let evil out, blow up the hole to seal it back in. There are just some hoops that you have to jump thru along the way for it to work and some of those can stretch the audience’s imagination to the breaking point. Hopefully that makes sense.

The kills in the movie are a bit tame but are creatively staged. We get a man falling thru stained glass with a throat cutting, a few folks getting ripped up by a claw appearing out of nowhere, another gets his heart ripped out, but my favorite has to be the dude in the wall. We see something grab him and later he is merged or hanging halfway out of a wall skinned. That is the best effect of the movie by far and will stick with me. We don’t see much of the evil god on screen other than the random clawed arm, but there is one reveal in backlight that hides much of the costume but gives enough for it to be satisfying. If you don’t have the budget for a creature be creative and let the audience fill in the blanks. They do that really well here.

Speaking of creative much of the tension is created with liberal use of industrial fans to create a creepy wind effect to let you know evil is present as well as some nifty sound design. The musical stingers as well as the odd sounds create an atmosphere that supports the ideas the story is attempting to sell to the audience. I like it when all the parts of a production work together like this. We also have some fun visuals including a nifty bit with the moon reflecting on the surface of water, the glowing yellow eyes to signify someone has seen something horrifying, as well as the way the tunnels and caverns are lit. Though the best is a Nightmare on Elm Street style bed attack on Alice. Yeah, I’ve seen it before but done this well it still works.

If I’m being honest the reason that I grabbed this VHS, and yes like all eighties oddities this was best watched on VHS, was the one recognizable name in the cast. Starring as Professor Lasky is the late great Donald Pleasence. I love the guy and mean no offense, but he did occasionally phone it is for a paycheck. Here in his limited screentime he is the highlight. Using his dialogue to help along the muddled plot makes a huge difference and the movie is way better when he is on screen. Unfortunately, he isn’t in much of the movie, which was a disappointment. But since I found myself on the fence with Specters his presence alone pushed it into the positives for me.

In conclusion if you dig Italian horror that leans into style (visuals, sound design) over substance (plot, narrative) then you might enjoy this movie. It certainly has that vibe and is worth a chance. On the other hand, if this sort of thing bugs you, I’d anticipate you hating Specters. Armed with this information I figure you can make your own decision. Personally, I’m glad to have watched it. Probably won’t need to ever revisit it, but still not a bad way to kill an hour and a half.

 

© Copyright 2024 John Shatzer

Ten Little Indians (1989)

This is the third different version of the movie that I’ve watched and the second that I’ve covered here at the site. I suppose that this is a spoiler, but I still like the version from nineteen forty-five better than this one. But this is better than the one from sixty-five. So, there you have my review… just kidding.

A group of ten strangers are lured to an African Safari by a Mr. Owen. U.K. Owen… yeah unknown. Their first night in camp a record is played as per his instructions and each of them is accused of getting away with murder. Though escaping the hangman’s noose is going to be corrected as one by one they are killed. After each death a centerpiece from the dining table has one less Indian on it as they are busted off. The murders also sort of match the various lines from the corresponding nursery rhyme. Though some are a stretch. Eventually there are just two of them left so they know that one of them is the killer pretending to be another victim lured here to pay for their crimes. Or are they? Spoiler there is a neat twist that is intact from the original play/novel that is always fun.

First thing I wanted to mention is that I had no idea until I popped this one on that it was a Cannon production. Though that explains some of the casting as they tended to pull from the same pool of “B” actors again and again. With that out of the way I guess the next question is “Did this need another version?”. Short answer is probably not. Other than changing some dialogue around the movie follows the same basic premise of both previous versions that I’ve seen. With nothing new to see here if you have already watched them the mystery is a hard sell. This is further complicated by a plot that meanders a bit in the middle slowing the proceedings down when it should have been picking up steam.

I didn’t think I was going to like the change in setting of the isolated house on an island, but the African Safari complete with a gorge on one side and hungry lions on the other works pretty good to create that sense of isolation that makes the story work. It also helps that I liked the cast and watching them interact with each other while bringing their characters to the screen. Brenda Vaccaro, Herbert Lom, and Paul L. Smith are fun to watch. This is especially so of Smith who has that “crazy eye” thing going on that makes him a perfect suspect! Though the best and most fun to watch performance comes from Donald Pleasence as Judge Wargrave. My only complaint with the casting is Frank Stallone as Lombard. He is supposed to be one of our main leads but isn’t that good of an actor. This is especially obvious when paired with one of the pros I’ve mentioned above. I needed more from the actor in this part.

I do like this story so any version of it already has a leg up with me. I also enjoyed the performances and I’ll pretty much watch anything with Donald Pleasence in it, so there is that. I suppose I can recommend this movie if this cast is to your liking or if Safaris are your thing. That said the original film is still the best. Though that might change since I just found out that there was another version of the movie shot in the seventies. Oh yeah I’m tracking that down!

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995)

This franchise continues to go further off the rails with this entry, the sixth in the series. Set six years after the events of Halloween 5 it opens with a grown-up Jamie giving birth. She makes a break for it with Michael in pursuit. It seems that he or the accomplices working with him have plans for the child. Yeah, I said accomplices. If you remember the previous movie a mysterious figure in cowboy boots broke him out of jail. Both he and Jamie have been missing since then. Who are these people and why Michael? There is some attempt to tie the story into the having to kill all the members of one bloodline to save the “village”. This is called the curse of Thorn. Totally forgot to mention that Michael now has a signature that he leaves at his murders… Screw this movie.

There is another plot line with Paul Rudd starring as now adult Tommy that was being babysat by Laurie in the first flick. He lives across the street from another batch of Strodes that are now living in the old Myers place. Why move your family into the house of the killer that terrorized your relatives? Because the dad is a jerk. Seriously, that is the reason. Toss in some stupid twists with a now retired Loomis and the new doctor taking care of Michael to thoroughly confuse things as the cherry on the top of this dog crap mess of a movie.

Clearly, I’m not a fan of The Curse of Michael Myers. This is a prime example of a movie that has no idea of the story it is trying to tell. As you can see above there are many different storylines that never seem to fit together. This makes for an uneven narrative that jumps around so much that it leaves the audience confused. There are many questions left unanswered. Why if it is Michael’s mission to end the bloodline and save the village does he allow Jamie to live all of those years? And when he was in the room right after the baby was born why didn’t he just kill them then rather than wait for the escape to go looking?

Loomis' last ride. Sucks it had to be in this.

Okay so maybe then he didn’t want the baby to die and instead needed Jamie to have it. Must have been some big deal with the cult that was helping and protecting him. Maybe they are going to harness evil or some other nonsense like that. But then why does he seemingly at random decide to kill the shit out of all of them? He slaughters all the people that were helping him before they finished whatever they were working on. I guess he just wanted to kill the bloodline… oh wait he had many chances to do that and didn’t!

There are more unanswered questions that I could go on with, but it is pointless. This movie feels like they had a lot of unfinished ideas that they tossed together without caring if it made any sense. Of all the sequels I’ve covered so far, this one is the most frustrating yet. It isn’t just bad it is ineptly made. For a franchise that had such a pedigree over the first couple flicks that is completely unacceptable. Being a horror flick I normally talk about the kills and gore. Not going to bother with The Curse of Michael Myers. It could have the best kills ever, executed with the skills of Tom Savini at his peak (it has neither) and it wouldn’t save this movie from being garbage. Shame on the producers and filmmakers involved in this disaster.

 

Ó Copyright 2021 John Shatzer

Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers (1989)

When last we saw Michael, he was being shot multiple times and falling into a mine or well. This movie shows us that he managed to roll out into a creek and float downstream until being helped out by an old man with a parrot who lived in a cabin. We are led to believe that he then proceeds to lie there in a coma for a year waiting for his next chance to go after his niece Jamie. The old man apparently just lets him lie there until he wakes up. Also, the police never go looking for the body I suppose, because it doesn’t seem like he would be that hard to find. Lots of unanswered questions.

But hey at least we know that Jamie stabbed her adoptive mother and is now possessed by the killer spirit that plagues the family. Only not really. In this movie she has spent the last year in a hospital being treated for being traumatized by her attempted murder. She can’t speak and starts having bad dreams after Michael wakes up. Her adoptive sister from the first movie is back, but just long enough to introduce another batch of teenagers to get murdered before she too is dispatched by Michael. The idea of her being the next killer is totally dropped as he tries to kill her yet again, all the while building up a body count.

I could keep trying to explain the plot, but it isn’t worth the effort. This movie is a complete mess that clearly didn’t know what the hell it was supposed to be. The tone shifts continually from the murderous rage of Michael, to the teenagers being irresponsible, and finally we get some comic relief in the local cops. They even get their own silly theme song and bungle their way along until they are brutally murdered… God Damn it movie what the Hell are you doing? Best of all is a mysterious guy in black boots that gets off a bus and sneaks around Haddonfield. He isn’t that important until we see him lay siege to the jail and breaks Myers out after Loomis had finally captured him. What is that all about? You have to wait for the next movie to find out. The Jamie character, which had been setup as central to the story is left abandoned in the middle of the police station as the writers decide to wander off in another direction with the jail break.

I normally don't notice... but this mask sucks!

This movie has a lot of ideas, none of which are developed. This makes for an uneven, illogical, and difficult to follow story that wears out its welcome quickly. There are more examples than I’ve listed above but why bother? I can’t think of a franchise that kept switching gears and rebooting itself like Halloween. With part four they tried the Jamie character and added some psychic connection to Michael. They began developing it more here and then bailed to start something else that was then followed up on in the next movie. I had some hope that the kills would be decent since I saw KNB was credited for the special effects work. We get one fun kill with a rake to the face that is on screen and fun, but the rest are either offscreen or tame. There is nothing here for fans of gore.

How could the people in charge run the Halloween franchise so far into the ground that this was the best idea they could come up with? It doesn’t even feel like a finished product and has that tossing things at the wall to see what sticks vibe to it. Don’t bother wasting your time on Halloween 5. I can’t believe that I have so many more to watch before I’m done with this series.

 

Ó Copyright 2021 John Shatzer

 

Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988)

Six years passed between the release of this movie and the unpopular Halloween III Season of the Witch. After the backlash from fans the producers decided to bring Michael Myers back for more killing, but he and Loomis were the only ones destined to return… this time. And if I’m to be honest it is here that the franchise begins to take a horrible turn.

Ten years have passed since the events of first two Halloween movies. During that time Laurie Strode has had time to fall in love, marry, have a daughter, and die in a car accident. Clearly Jamie Lee Curtis’ career was doing well enough she had no desire to come anywhere near this one. It is Halloween and Jamie, the daughter, has been adopted and is getting ready to go trick or treating. See what they did there with the name? Well that is about as clever as they are going to get with this one. Michael Myers wakes up as he is being transferred and comes after her. 

Wait a minute didn’t he and Loomis die? Nope they both survived the explosion so when Michael heads back to Haddonfield his is followed by Loomis. Along the way Michael takes out the phone lines and Loomis’ car. This is a very different Michael Myers from the early films. Here he has strategy and sets up his victims. By the time Loomis arrives in town the killings have already started. Jamie and her adopted older sister Rachel are the last survivors and flee town in a pickup truck full of well-armed locals. That isn’t as safe as it sounds. 

I could keep going on with the plot synopsis, but I won’t. This movie is where the Halloween franchise starts going off the rails. In the earlier movies Myers was scary because he was the shape. He was a killing machine without any clear motivation. Just a screwed up human being that could take some punishment and clearly had the ability to ignore pain. He was the boogeyman. With the start of this movie they decided to make him something else. After ten years in a coma he sits up and has all of his strength. He knows right where Jamie is and how to get back to Haddonfield. Bullets don’t stop him, getting hit by a car doesn’t slow him down. He has become an unstoppable killing machine with supernatural powers. 

Why do this? They were clearly watching the other big franchises like Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street, both of which featured a killer that you couldn’t destroy and that had supernatural powers. This copied it and in doing that tossed everything that made this franchise special. If that weren’t bad enough, they didn’t even do a good job at that. The script is awful and filled with plot holes and mistakes. First Michael appears to be able to be in a lot of different places at once. He has the time to kill everyone at the police station (again because he is now bullet proof…until he isn’t) and get to the power station to turn the lights off. All so he can almost immediately appear at the house where he knows that Jamie and her sister are at. 

Come on movie you have to at least make some sense. They double down with him suddenly hanging onto the back long after they should have left him back in town. Of course, they had to do this to get the big ending where suddenly shooting Michael hurts him and knocks him down a mine shaft or whatever the hell that was. Then of course we get the big shock ending when it appears that Jamie has become the killer now. Considering they made the point of putting her in the same damn costume that Michael wore as a child when he killed his sister was it really a surprise? I did enjoy Loomis trying to shoot her… Donald Pleasence is awesome but doesn’t get enough screen time. 

I should also mention that I found the kills to be disappointing. You get a finger to the forehead and a throat torn out, but everything else is just off screen or happens when the camera isn’t looking. If you are going to try and be one of the other big franchises, then at least give me some gore. I know that many horror flicks were getting neutered, but this is tame even by comparison to what the MPAA was letting slide. 

This is a bad movie that I have managed to avoid watching for years. I had hoped that it might have aged well, but it didn’t. The only good thing that I can say is that Halloween 4 is better than the horrors that followed. 

© Copyright 2021 John Shatzer

Halloween (1978)

This is another of those movies that I feel a bit silly reviewing. Even the most casual of fans has to know about the original John Carpenter classic that launched the franchise. But since I’m doing a retrospective on the series, I figured it was necessary to preach to the choir just a bit.

The movie kicks off twenty years in the past where we see a teenage girl getting frisky with her boyfriend. He leaves afterwards, and someone sneaks up on her stabbing her do death with a kitchen knife. We quickly discover that it was her younger brother Michael, basically just a kid. Then the action shifts to the “present” or twenty years later. Dr. Loomis is getting ready to transport the now adult Michael for an evaluation to see if he can be released. Not much chance of that since according to the good doctor he has been starring at the walls for the last couple of decades. But when the car arrives to pick him up the patients are wandering around in the dark and Michael soon steals the car and takes off. Where is he headed? Home of course.

The rest of the movie is Michael stalking some random high school girls that happen to be babysitting kids on Halloween night, targeting one in particular. Her name is Laurie Strode and she had the misfortune of dropping the keys off at the old Myer’s house while Michael was hiding out. He literally went home you see. Loomis arrives in town and with the sheriff starts hunting Michael aka. the Boogeyman. After some deaths he finally starts chasing Laurie, but before he can get her Loomis shows up and Michael ends up dead… or does he?

Before anyone fires off an angry email about Laurie being Michael’s sister and that it wasn’t all random please stop. Remember that was added in Halloween part II so here it is all random and unexplained. I’ve always preferred that because Michael is much scarier when he doesn’t have a backstory. In this movie he is just the shape, an evil killing machine that doesn’t need motivation or reason. If you have the misfortune of meeting up with him, you die. That is way scarier so when I watch this one, I try and forget about the attempts later in the series to explain the character. Hell, the more they try and explain him the worse the movies get.

The lighting, camera work, music, and setting all work together to make Halloween as scary as any movie you will ever watch. Many of the fans have seen this one so much that they have become calloused to how great it is. There are scenes where Michael is in the background and we the audience can see him, but the characters can’t. Other times the characters do see him and then just as quickly he is gone. But my favorite bit is where he steps out of the shadows behind the Laurie Strode character with only the white of his mask being visible at first. These aren’t simple jump scares, but instead are creepy and set the tone for the action.

Many cite this and Black Christmas as the first slasher movies. I’ve never felt like the original Halloween was a slasher movie. It doesn’t have the in your face kills and gores that those movies feature. Instead the kills here aren’t as over the top and you don’t see knives or blood splashing everywhere. You get one simple stabbing and a couple strangulations. They are slightly disturbing when you realize this is likely how a serial killer would get rid of his victims, but it certainly isn’t the bloodbath that we would see in the slasher craze of the eighties. Halloween instead focuses more on the characters, especially Laurie and Dr. Loomis. Jamie Lee Curtis is great as Laurie and pulls of the horror of seeing all of her friends killed very well. But it is Donald Pleasance as Dr. Loomis that is most memorable. He basically steals every scene that he is in and has all of the best lines, both serious with his monologues as well as some funny one liners.

There is a reason that Halloween spawned a franchise. It’s a classic that caught everyone by surprise and became part of the culture. And while I don’t consider this a slasher movie it also helped spawn that phenomenon that dominated the nineteen eighties and beyond. This is a must see if you consider yourself a horror movie fan.

 

Ó Copyright 2021 John Shatzer

Tales that Witness Madness (1973)

I’m a huge fan of the Anthologies from Amicus Studios and while this isn’t from them it was directed by the great Freddie Francis and features familiar face Donald Pleasence. Given those illustrious connections I had hoped that it would be of the same quality. I hadn’t seen this one before I picked up the Blu-Ray but was excited to pop it in and see what I got.

The wrap around story has Pleasence’s character, a doctor at a mental hospital, speaking to a colleague and showing him four patients that he has been treating. He is trying to prove that he has figured out something that he needs to share with the investigators, which is to mean those looking into the crimes that his deranged wards are accused of committing. What has he figured out? I guess that his patients are innocent and that the crazy stories that they have to tell are true. That leads to the individual segments of the movie.

First up is the tale of Paul, a sad little boy with an imaginary friend and parents that are constantly fighting. The more they bicker the more the little boy escapes into his pretend world where he feeds and talks to his friend. That friend just happens to be a tiger and eventually his parents think that he has taken it too far when the walls and doors get gouged up. Though they find out that what they thought was an imaginary friend might not be so after all.

This one was fun. The story is paced well, and they do a good job with old school movie tricks to make you think that a tiger might be walking around. There are muddy paw prints, scratched doors, and growling sounds that seem to come from empty rooms. My only complaint is that the payoff isn’t that great, happens off screen and is only heard. Even for an early seventies flick they could have given us more than someone tossing some red paint onto a wall from offscreen.

The second story is goofy as hell, but sort of interesting. Timothy has just inherited a bunch of furniture and other household junk from his aunt. Luckily, he runs an antique shop so has an outlet for them. One of the items is a strange picture of his uncle Albert, whom I don’t think he knew, as well as an old bike that belonged to him. Not even a day goes by before the picture shows itself to be haunted and the bike is pulling him in and taking him to the past. A ghost with a time machine… not seen that before.

Unlike the first story which makes sense I’m not sure what this one is supposed to be. Was the girl in the park his lost love? If so, then why does he seem so angry? Also why does Albert try to kill everyone? Nothing is explained at all which I found annoying. I did think the different pictures that get substituted as Albert watches Timothy are pretty funny, though probably not on purpose. I liked the time travel twist, but it goes nowhere.

Our third story has to do with a man named Brian. While out running errands, he finds a tree in the woods and drags it home. His wife, played by Joan Collins, is unhappy about this as it makes a mess. But they go about their day drinking, laughing, and arguing all while Brian becomes more and more obsessed with it. Eventually it becomes clear that the tree is trying to come between them. This leads to a predictable, but fun ending.

This was another interesting idea that didn’t get executed well. Even though it isn’t’ on screen that much this did tend to drag a bit. How scary is a tree? Evil Dead being the exception to that rule of course. Of the four this is by far the weakest. I don’t have much more to say about it. 

The last is by far the best of the bunch. Kim Novak is Auriol a publisher that is excited to have her latest author come to town to promote his newest book. She decides to throw him a big party with the Luau theme since he is from Hawaii. Kimo, the author, has his own plans as we see early on, he is on a mission to save his and his mother’s eternal souls with some native ritual. This leads to murder and a bit of cannibalism… Now that is a party!

This isn't going to end well!

While you don’t see much of anything on screen as far as gore, they do a good job of implying it. I mean one of the characters gets butchered and fed to her family! Yeah, this one is a bit mean and awesome. Also Doctor Who fans might be interested in seeing Mary Tamm in one of her early roles. Spoilers, you get to see quite of bit of her! The pacing of the segment is solid as you know something bad is coming and they keep teasing you with it. The final frame is a nice payoff and satisfying.

I’m glad that I finally took the time to watch Tales that Witness Madness. While not nearly as good as a movie like Torture Garden (another Francis directed movie) I had some fun with it. I probably won’t be in a hurry to watch it again, but it was worth a look especially if you like this type of movie and enjoy the horror coming out of England in the sixties and seventies. Though if these are new to you, I’d recommend checking out previously mentioned Torture Garden or Tales from the Crypt instead.

© Copyright 2019 John Shatzer