Mammoth (2006)

I thought that I’d end my October 2023 movie review marathon with my all time favorite Sci-Fi Channel original. I watch this one every year but somehow had never covered it for the site. I’m guess I kept thinking I had already covered Mammoth, but I hadn’t. I also suppose it was a spoiler telling you that it is my all-time favorite from the Sci-Fi channel. Oh well, onto the review.

There is a frozen mammoth carcass being studied by a scientist named Frank. He leaves work late to take his daughter, Jack, for her driving test. We see that he is late when she is watching old movies with her grandpa and Frank’s Dad Simon. This is our primary family unit and main characters along with a man in black type who happens to be a lady named Agent Powers as well as Jack’s boyfriend Squirrelly.

Okay now back to the story. While poking around the frozen mammoth Frank accidentally activates a doohickey that calls to space. We see a spaceship shoot something to Earth in response. It crashes into the museum and turns into some living liquid that then animates the mammoth’s corpse. It goes on a rampage killing folks and doing alien invader type stuff. This includes crashing a high school party filled with thirty year olds. Eventually our heroes figure out that while they can’t destroy it they can refreeze it which leads to an exciting showdown at a factory where they do just that.

This is a simple movie that takes the standard low budget formula that was used not only in these made for television Sci-Fi channel originals but also for the cheapie fifties flicks that I love as well and has some fun with it. Fun is the operative word here as this isn’t the sort of movie that should be taken seriously. The story is filled with all the tropes you would expect including a monster stomping around unnoticed by anyone not top billed, government agents who show up with all sorts of mysterious technology, and some bumbling slapstick from characters who only seem to exist to be incompetent. That last bit is what makes Mammoth such a good time as instead of trying to be serious it leans into the jokes and laughs. Let me give you some examples.

We have the boyfriend, Squirrelly, who stumbles around putting himself in danger along with a couple of sheriff deputies that lean more into silly dialogue that shows them to be less than intelligent. There are also some goofy bits with a one handed medical examiner who along with the sheriff have a huge secret that is only revealed when needed to crack some wise. There is even a funny throwaway gag with what I’d like to call Jurassic dentures. Trust me if you watch Mammoth you will know exactly the scene I’m talking about. I’m thinking that either this was added back in after it was broadcast or if it did air on cable the censors missed what was implied.

Even the actors playing straight man, or I suppose men get to have some fun with goofy dialogue. Vincent Ventresca, who plays Frank, gets to have fun with dialogue talking about having a daughter and worrying about all the wieners as well as the classic “Did you give her the WEED?”. But the one who is clearly having the most fun is Tom Skerritt playing Grandpa Simon. He is the true believer of the family and has all sorts of fun with is conspiracy theories as well as thinking the gorilla suit wearing singing telegram is the lead creature of an invasion of space monkeys!

The special effects aren’t great. As is the case with most Sci-Fi channel originals this is all CGI and hasn’t held up well. Though it probably wasn’t great to begin with. The mammoth stomps around but does very little interaction with the actors. Most of the kills are hidden either behind the mammoth or some other object like a car or building. The best gag in the movie is probably the hand in the morgue. Even that is played for laughs as we see it scurrying around in the background. Truthfully, I appreciated that they knew the limits on what they could do and had fun with it. If they tried to be serious then the bad CGI would have likely been a dealbreaker for me.

I’m telling you guys this is a silly flick and a lot of fun. You just need to turn off your brain and have a good time. If you want a serious or scary creature feature then Mammoth isn’t the movie for you. It is one of those perfect excuses to invite some friends over, crack open a beer, and laugh your ass off.  I highly recommend it.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

Zombie Town (2023)

I’m a bit older than many of you who frequent the site, so I was never a “Goosebumps kid”. Though I totally understand the sense of nostalgia that many of you have for the book series and the Saturday morning show. Anything that introduces the next generation to the spooky stuff gets a big thumbs up from me. That said I actually really dug the first Goosebumps movie with Jack Black and those Fear Street flicks that Netflix did from another R.L. Stine property were pretty good as well. I had hope we were going to have some more fun when I saw this movie based on one of his books show up to stream on Hulu.

Mike hates horror movies and can’t wait to “escape” from his small town life. His friend Amy and most of the folks who live in the small town are huge horror fans. That is mostly because a famous director of zombie flicks, Len Carver, is from there. Since he is the most famous resident folks are all about his movies. Though he is a bit of a recluse and hasn’t made any new movies in many years. That is until he decides to premier a new flick, Zombie Town, at the local theater. Mike works there and decides to show Amy the movie early. When the do though something happens and most of the townsfolk turn into zombies.

Why not Amy and Mike? There is something about an ancient curse and the symbols on the film cans they were inexplicably using as trays for their popcorn and soda. The rest of the story has them running around town trying not to get turned into zombies while at the same time sorting out how to save their friends and families. Along the way we learn the big secret of director Carver and why he has been a recluse for so many years. Not to worry though when we get to the end credits it all works out.

Honestly, I was disappointed. The story is very slow with little happening and what we do see has been done much better elsewhere. That surprised me. Now I’ve never read the book but what few things I’ve read from Stine always struck me as at least entertaining. Sure it might be watered down and tamed for a young audience, but it still had some meat on the bone. Most of what happens here are the main characters running from location to location stopping long enough for a zombie to show up and do something before they flee again. There isn’t a single memorable sequence or scene. This is further complicated by what I have to say is a terrible cast who bring nothing to the screen. This includes Dan Akroyd who seems to be sleepwalking thru his scenes for a paycheck as well as Chevy Chase who is barely in the movie.

While I wasn’t expecting anything too disturbing or horrific being a PG-13 movie based off of a tween book I had hoped for more than I got here. The zombies are all rather tame and don’t bite or even menace folks too much. In fact, some of them, like zombie Landro, are played for laughs. We see zombies doing pratfalls and one acting as a chauffeur. But even some of the Saturday morning shows had a bit of a creepy edge to them and at least one scare. We get none of that here not even a cheap jump scare. The creature design is okay and if there were any real attempts to make them creepy or threating it might have worked. Sadly we got neither so the creature part of Zombie Town falls flat for me as well.

Bad story, bad acting, bad creatures, bad movie. I’m not sure much else needs to be said here. If you are wanting to check out something much better Hulu also released a Goosebumps limited series with Justin Long. I’m a couple of episodes in so far and it is way creepier with a better cast. It makes me feel like the filmmakers here didn’t do justice to the original material. When done right Stine’s work translates well to the screen. Check out the show and skip this movie.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

Dead Meat (2004)

This isn’t my first time watching this movie as I think I checked it out fourteen or fifteen years ago for my old website. I don’t remember anything about it so that is probably a bad sign. And this is another low budget zombie flick, which of course I said I wasn’t going to do again. But I think we all knew I wasn’t going to stop. What did draw me back to this one is the director, Conor McMahon. This was I think his first feature film and later did some movies that I really dig. Check out Stitches (a clown back from the dead for some murders!) and Let the Wrong One In (silly vampire comedy) if you get the chance. Also, this isn’t just a indie low budget zombie flick but it is an Irish indie low budget zombie flick. Don’t see many of those. Now onto the review. 

The movie opens with a farmer hearing some strange noises outside and going out to check on them. He gets attacked by a zombie cow. Let that process for a second. Movie you have my attention. Then the action moves to a couple driving along while an announcer on the radio talks about a farmer who was illegally feeding dead animals to his herd. They are distracted and hit a man in the road killing him. Or did they? I mean he was already dead and proceeds to tear the man’s, Martin, throat out. This leads to his lady friend, Helena, to head off to the creepy farm nearby for help. After poking around a bit zombie Martin shows up and she has to dispatch him and then flee when more zombies show up. 

Later she runs into local gravedigger and all around good guy Desmond. The pair of them head off to his house but keep getting waylaid by more zombies. Eventually they meet up with a little girl, never ever trust kids in zombie movies, and another couple Cathal and Francie. This group decides to head to a rescue station but again keep running into zombie problems. This includes the return of the zombie cow from earlier! The survivors are eventually cornered in a castle and have to do battle with the horde of undead that surround them. 

Finally it happened I found a filmmaker that is able to make a movie that doesn’t try to exceed the resources available at hand. This movie, both directed and written by McMahon, has a small cast and simple story. Get from point A to point B. Along the way we get a few set pieces with some local undead attacking them. The locations are simple and were what was available to them. They don’t use some terrible CGI to make giant hordes or try and shoot scenes on busy city streets while onlookers watch. The characters crack a few jokes, deliver their lines well, and do a fine job in the action sequences. The story moves along at a brisk pace never slowing down from the opening scene to the final scene. There is always something happening during the entire hour and twenty minute running time. Now what that hard to do? Apparently so since most of the folks in the almost twenty years since this was made have failed to achieve it. 

Being a zombie movie, we should talk about the special effects work. I don’t think that there are any “featured” lead undead that will stand out. But overall the makeup is good enough. I mean these are all supposed to be pretty fresh, so it works. Most of the kills are actually inflicted on the dead folks. We get a smashed head, another is run thru, there is a stick to the eyeball, a jaw is knocked off a face, and we get a zombie head lopped off with a shovel complete with some brains spilling out. Though my favorite is a kill that I’ve never seen before. A zombie is dispatched with a vacuum sucking out an eyeball! I’ve watched a lot of flicks in this shuffling subgenre and I can honestly say I’ve not seen that before. All of the work is practical and occasionally shows the low budget but that is part of the charm here. 

As an added bit of extra fun keep an eye out, pun not intended, for the road zombie that chomps on Martin. He is played by Ned Dennehy who would later go on to appear in much larger roles in flicks like Guns Akimbo and Mandy. He has also appeared in shows like Outlander (a favorite of my lovely wife) as well as The Walking Dead franchise. Just cool to see someone near the beginning of their career or at least notoriety in the genre. 

Dead Meat isn’t perfect, but I had fun with it. This is the sort of good time on a budget that I’m always hoping to get when I dive into the shallow end of low budget zombie flicks. It worked out for me… this time. You can find this one on YouTube as well as a few other spots on the internet. Give it a shot. 

© Copyright 2023 JohnShatzer

Spasmo (1974)

I thought I mix things up a bit here for the marathon with some Giallo goodness from director Umberto Lenzi. This movie finds a man named Christian walking on the beach with a lady when they see what they think is a body. Turns out the woman was just sleeping. Her name is Barbara and Christian becomes obsessed with her. He tracks her down to a yacht party where the pair hit it off. Just as things are going well and he is about to bed her a man breaks into the place and threatens him with a gun. Well not wanting to be denied there is a fight, and the intruder is shot. Here is where things get weird.

They don’t report this to the police. Instead, they head out to a house that belongs to Barbara’s artistic friend. They don’t know that it has been leased to a weird pair who befriend them. Oh, and the dead guy isn’t dead, at least not right away. We also get a subplot about Christian and his brother, who runs their father’s company. He is the black sheep of the family. If that weren’t enough there is also a killer running around killing women. I can’t say much more without giving away spoilers and I don’t want to do that. 

This is an entertaining movie that had me confused, in a good way. There is clearly something going on and while we don’t know right away how all the characters connect, they eventually do give the audience a satisfying ending. I had several guesses as to what was going on and I have to say that I was very wrong. When we do finally see it, then things become clear. Things that were clearly happening under our noses. This is the kind of movie that is fun to watch a second time to see all the spots where they hinted at the big twist. If found the story engaging and a fun watch. 

The cast is solid with Robert Hoffman, who I remember from Eyes Behind the Stars which I really enjoyed. Ivan Rassimov who was in some other killer Gialli like All the Colors of the Dark has a smaller role as Christian’s brother Ivan. I wish we got more of his creepy self in this flick. But what is the best bit of casting was the lovely Suzy Kendall playing the female lead Barbara. She did a lot of cool flicks with my favorite being either Torso or The Bird with the Crystal Plumage. Both of which I should get around to reviewing for the site. I mention all of this because Lenzi assembled a hell of a cast for Spasmo and that only makes the already solid movie even better. 

The kills in this movie aren’t all that explicit or honestly that great. This is tame compared to many other Gialli. We also only get five deaths in the movie. But each of them is impactful and move the story along. So, they serve their purpose. Spasmo isn’t about shocking you with violence but instead sucking you in to the plot and getting you to care about the characters. That it does very well. If you are looking for a bloody Giallo to watch then maybe Bay of Blood or one of Argento’s flicks are more up your alley. 

I really liked this movie. If what I’ve mentioned above hasn’t convinced you to watch Spasmo then how about an original score from the master Ennio Morricone! Seriously this movie had one hell of a creative crew both in front of as well as behind the camera. I highly recommend it and think that this is a great place for someone new to the genre to start. 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

Night of the Hunted (2023)

I’m always on the lookout for the next creepy horror flick to get under my skin. When this popped up on Shudder and I saw that it was about a random sniper killing folks while taunting a woman I thought it sounded interested. I always cringe when someone says they are going to “update” an old trope, but this sounded like a creative take on it. So, I fired up my Shudder app and plopped myself down for a watch.

Alice is woken up in her hotel room by her phone going off. She has been at a convention with her work colleague John and is now headed back home. There is also talk from a friend on the phone about her seeing a fertility doctor as she and her husband are trying for a baby. As she and John are driving out of the Hotel parking lot we see that someone has poked a hole in the gas tank. This leads to them stopping at an isolated station in the early hours of the morning. Here is where things really get rolling.

Alice goes in for a cup of coffee while John fills the tank. She can’t find the clerk but does eventually notice a blood spray on the wall. This freaks her out and when she goes to leave takes a bullet to the arm. Freaked out she crawls back into the store. She hears someone on a walkie talkie and picks it up asking for help. After John comes in and is gunned down we find out that the guy on the other end is the sniper. Not only that he knows a lot about Alice, so you get the idea that this was all a setup. I mean someone punctured their gas tank and knew her secrets so… yeah there must be something else to this. The rest of the movie is him taunting her, shooting anyone else who stops by, and basically torturing her. Why? Is this a random wacko? Is someone targeting her? Is it because she was having an affair with John? I’m not asking these questions the sniper is as he taunts her.

Some slight spoilers are in the review so if you don’t like that sort of thing head to the last paragraph for my final thoughts on Night of the Hunted as well to see if I recommend it or not. Now onto the review. This is an interesting movie. First of all, I can assure you that we never really get the answers to the questions posed above which I’m okay with. I like the idea of a killer without identity and motivation. Sadly the movie sort of spoils that itself.

The first forty minutes are brutal and terrifying. The killer speaks only enough to get under Alice’s skin and make her terrified. The unexpected and undeserved violence is what drives the fear which the first half of the story uses to get and hold the audience’s attention. The setting of the isolated gas station by the highway in the middle of the night is one that I think we can all relate to which makes the story even scarier. When a horror flick puts the audience into a situation where they could legitimately find themselves it already has a leg up and the filmmakers us that brilliantly here.

Here is where the movie goes off the rails and sort of spoils things for me. The sniper keeps talking to her and eventually goes on an extended political rant about mandatory vaccinations, microchips, cancel culture and wokeness. It gets way too political as we go from scary horror movie to the filmmaker’s going on some personal rant. It really isn’t so much what his politics are but the fact that somehow the script is trying to explain to the audience his motivation for the killings. Sure, there seems to be something more to it and is sure as hell seems Alice is being targeted but we don’t need to know for sure. Think John Carpenter’s Halloween. The shape killed without motivation and was basically just evil walking the earth. That is way scarier. The more they tried to explain him the worse the sequels got. Same thing here.

I also felt that the killer talking about actual mass shootings was in poor taste. Using real world tragedies in dialogue or as fodder for your story makes me very uncomfortable and one should tread carefully when doing so. They weren’t disrespectful or anything like that but for what is effectively just a low budget horror movie it felt inappropriate. If you wanted to invoke that shared fear of mass shootings coming from someone you didn’t know then stick to what sniper saying just enough to taunt Alice and stop trying to explain things.

Alice really is having a rough night

The kills are long distance and lean more into us knowing what is coming before it actually happens rather than being overly gory. There is a gnarly bullet wound on Alice’s arm that she has to dump hand sanitizer on and then glue shut. That is right in your face and well done. Near the end of the movie, we also get a head squished which is again right in your face as the camera doesn’t pull away. Other than that, we see bullet hits and an occasional after the fact gnarly head wound. This isn’t the sort of movie that I would anticipate elaborate kills or gore so I was happy with what I got onscreen. It is just enough to add to the tension and overall horror of Alice and her situation. It works perfectly with the story.

The director of Night of the Hunted, Franck Khalfoun, has done some other movies that I personally think are way better than this one. P2, the Maniac remake, and even Amityville: The Awakening are all solid efforts. Here the script lets him down with the uneven pacing which occurs when it starts to focus on the killer talking. But I can’t let him off the hook since he cowrote the script.

In the end there are a lot to like here. My only issues are the pacing and oversharing by the killer that causes them. I can’t wholeheartedly recommend Night of the Hunted but think it is probably still worth a watch.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

Blood Beast from Outer Space (1965)

The movie opens with some scientists tracking what they initially think is a meteor about to crash into the countryside near London. But then it starts to slow down, and they quickly figure out that it is being controlled by something. Then we get a groovy sixties theme song over the opening credits before rejoining the scientists at an army roadblock. Dr. Morley and Dr. Costain go to see the man in charge as they have the clearance to work on top secret stuff. Instead of a ship they find a small sphere that is brought back to the lab for study. Weird stuff starts to happen and poor Dr. Morley is killed when something materializes and kills him before taking off with the object making good it’s escape in a stolen car.

Then the action moves to later. How much later? I don’t have a clue. But the army guys are gone and Dr. Costain is now in the offices of Scotland Yard talking to an inspector about missing women. Somehow, it isn’t ever explained, he has figured out that whatever came out of the sphere is now posting ads in Bikini Girl Magazine and kidnapping or killing the ladies that respond to it. Why? It is only hinted at but basically the alien is planning on bringing them back home to one of the moons of Jupiter so they can breed. I guess Jupiter’s moon needs women! Some murders happen, shenanigans ensue, and the alien gets away with his hostages. I mean he insists they won’t be hurt. Though being forced to bear the children of an alien race doesn’t seem pleasant. But hey it was the sixties so what do I know?

This is an odd movie. Other than the obvious logical loopholes like how did Dr. Costain make the connection to the missing girls and the visitor from outer space, which is the most blatant but not the only head scratcher, Blood Beast from Outer Space is sort of boring. It kicks off with the mystery and some action but then abruptly jumps to some time later. It feels like something is missing from the story. This was based on a book so I’m thinking maybe there was more to it but that the movie couldn’t squeeze it into the standard ninety minute runtime. It was at that jump where the movie lost me. It also doesn’t help that we go from science, monsters, and creepy spheres to the police interviewing quirky characters while trying to solve the mystery of Medra. Which is the name that the alien uses on Earth. There are also thrilling phone calls, people typing, and ladies going to bed. Meh.

Doing science stuff!

I hadn’t heard of this movie before so it must not have played on my local horror hosted shows. What caught my attention was the fact that the late great John Saxon stars as Dr. Costain. I’m always down to watch him. He is good but sadly there is absolutely nothing here for him to work with. There is also a twenty minute stretch where he completely disappears from the story which is also where Blood Beast is at it’s slowest. No surprise there.

The lack of creature is also a disappointment. Medra is mostly in the shadows and except for the very end where we see one tiny bit of rubber on his face the only creature effect we see is his one messed up hand. I get the feeling that this was a super low budget affair, but couldn’t they have spent a bit more on the monster?

With a story that is hard to follow, a creature that never pays off, and the wasting of John Saxon I can’t recommend Blood Beast from Outer Space. It is an uneven and at times annoying watch which I simply can’t recommend.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023)

Look boys and girls a beloved children’s classic has entered the public domain. I sure how someone does something clever to turn the characters and story on their head. Maybe a gleefully fucked up horror flick! I’m actually being serious about this. I had a blast with The Banana Splits Movie from a few years ago and I think we all know that the equally goofy Willy’s Wonderland was a riff on Chuck E Cheese. I really had hope for this movie which only makes what I got feel even worse.

The story is simple. Christopher Robin, the boy who was friends with all the inhabitants of the 100 Acre Wood, left them to go off to college. Apparently, he was their only source of food so without him they all starved. That is until they murdered Eeyore and ate him. This turned Pooh, Piglet, and the others (who we never see in this movie) into angry forest dwelling carnivores in coveralls. We find this all out in a voiceover done storybook style before we meet the characters. When we do it is Christopher and his wife returning home so he can show her his old friends. Pooh murders the shit out of his lady and chains Christopher up in a barn for some torture porn action! Really, he whips him with Eeyore’s tail.

The main part of the story is about a woman suffering from a traumatic stalking incident. We know this because when we first see her she is in therapy and later fills in the gaps when she confesses what happened to her friends. She and four of her pals, five if you count the one who dies on the way and is fed to a woodchipper (not as cool as it sounds), go to an isolated yet fancy cabin for some girl time. Somehow no one has noticed that this beautiful well maintained house is next door to homicidal critters and has been for the last five years! Pooh and Piglet hear some loud music and decide to kill the girls. The rest of the movie is them chasing, leaving them alone with a running car only for them to not leave, and then killing a bunch of locals who pick the survivors up on the road. All of this is wrapped up in a neat little nihilistic bow that leaves room for a sequel that I pray never happens.

But a sequel that will likely get made. This flick was made on a low budget of around one hundred thousand so the roughly five million it made is a huge return on investment. This isn’t because this is a good movie though but rather because idiots like me rented or purchased a copy because we had to see it. Remember when I said I had hoped they would do something interesting and twisted with the concept? Okay I actually said gleefully fucked up, but that is basically the same thing. Right?

Flannel and overalls... I shit you not!

Anyway, that isn’t what we got. Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey plays more like a terrible rip off of a Wrong Turn movie. Pull the masks off and make them inbred hillbillies and you have every other generic shitty city folk getting massacred flick that dominated the horror genre for a few years there. They are literally wearing overalls and Pooh is decked out in a flannel shirt! Now had they pulled this off it would have been disappointing but still sort of okay. But they can’t even do a shitty knockoff right. The pacing is terrible with a bit of action, then lots of talking about feelings, then an okay kill followed by a boring flashback.

If that weren’t bad enough our protagonists, the five ladies who make it to the cabin, are so utterly devoid of depth that I had a hard time keeping track of their names much less give a rat’s ass about them getting brutally murdered. Just to be clear I’m in no way blaming the actresses here as the story gives them nothing to work with. It is also important to point out that whenever a movie like this adds random characters into the story solely to up the body count that should tell you that they had an incomplete script or that the idea/gimmick didn’t have enough legs to fill out a feature length movie. This happens not once, nor twice, but three times as we have the friend who never shares a scene with anyone else, a random lady whose face is torn up, and four locals who come to the girl’s rescue.

If this isn’t proof enough the ladies set Christopher Robin free who promptly disappears only to reappear at the end to save the day. Which also brings me to an ending that is both depressing as well as pointless. Does Pooh kill him? Probably not since this smacks of “we are awesome and have a new horror franchise” delusions. Though the director has already announced a sequel as well as an expanded universe that I guess is going to give Bambi the same treatment. What the hell guys?

I suppose I should talk about the kills and makeup. We get a respectable eleven deaths. Many are offscreen but we do see a neck snap, a topless women fed to a woodchipper (again not as cool as it sounds), a woman’s head run over by a BMW, heads gets smashed, a face gets eaten offscreen, a decapitation also offscreen, and a sledgehammer to the noggin’. This all sounds decent, but it is executed with terrible CGI that even the Asylum would be ashamed of. Well, if they were ever ashamed of anything. The creature design fairs a bit better with just Pooh and Piglet making an appearance. The actors are basically just wearing masks and they aren’t very articulated. Remember these are supposed to be actual creatures and not random killers in masks so this makes a difference. Overall, the special effects work isn’t very special.

This is just a poorly made generic cash in on a well-known property hitting public domain. It was sold with controversy and some perverse “I need to see this” need from horror fans, myself included. If I could speak directly to the filmmakers I’d have to say, “My dude you fooled horror nerds once, you won’t get us again. Don’t be surprised when your next opus faceplants now that we know the quality of your work.” I know that sounds harsh but if you had sat thru what I just did, which I wholeheartedly don’t recommend, you would understand and I think agree with me.  Skip this mess and go watch The Banana Splits Movie.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer