Amityville: A New Generation (1993)

Time to check out Amityville: A New Generation aka. Amityville 7. This movie is set in a shitty neighborhood on the west coast. There is a warehouse that has been split up into artists flats with one of them being occupied by a guy named Keyes, who is a photographer. He is shooting some pictures when he sees an old homeless guy. He takes his picture and then tries to give him some money which is when the man gives him back a mirror. A creepy mirror. Soon that homeless guy is dead, and Keyes is interviewed by the police.

Spooky shit starts to happen when Keyes' downstairs neighbor, Suki, takes the mirror. It causes her to make these freaky painting as well as causing her abusive ex-boyfriend to run his head thru some glass. What is up? The mirror is from the Amityville house and Keyes’ father was the dude who killed his family there and after getting released brought the mirror out to his son so that he could be possessed by the demon that was in it. This happens because… I have no freaking clue!

Sooner or later I’m going to have to like one of these Amityville flicks, right? Well, this isn’t going to be it. The pacing of the movie is dreadful with long stretches of overly stylized shots of nothing happening. Okay I get it some of the paintings are very colorful, but how about we get some plot and characters up in here? The plot is very thin and easy to figure out. As soon as the homeless guy hands the mirror to Keyes, I knew it must have come from the house and that he was likely connected to both it and the man giving it to him. I do appreciate that he basically wants nothing to do with it and lets Suki take it, but then when she kills herself, he takes it back. Dude if it was already creeping you out why bring it home after your friend has died? This is the sort of nonsense that passes for a story, and I didn’t like it.

The dialogue is stilted and odd in that overly stylized nineties shot for cable way. It doesn’t feel natural and forces the cast of decent actors to struggle to spit it out. The cast features David Naughton, Richard Roundtree, and Terry O’Quinn in supporting roles. We even get a small appearance from Lin Shaye as a nurse in a psychiatric hospital. They are all wasted by this movie. Yes, Amityville: A New Generation manages to give Shaft and the Stepfather absolutely nothing to do! That is unforgivable. Instead, we get a bunch of young actors that clearly have no clue what they are doing and haven’t done much in the almost thirty years since.

We get a lame three kills with little to no gore. The best gag in the movie is zombie Suki and even that is only okay. The budget is obviously very low which caused some very odd decisions. In typical movie fashion we have our romantic leads getting frisky not once but twice. Now in a classy flick they would shoot this in front of a roaring fire, but here they choose to do so in front of a shitty space heater. I kid you not! The evil mirror looks like a cheap prop you can pick up every October from Spirit Halloween so not great.

The best thing I can say about Amityville: A New Generation is that it is very silly. I laughed at it more than once, though I don’t believe that was their intent. This isn’t enough to save the flick and I can’t recommend it. Well, I guess we are on to the next one… Amityville Dollhouse.

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

Amityville 1992: It’s About Time (1992)

Remember a couple reviews ago when I was asking what could be worse than a haunted lamp and I derisively said something about a clock? Well, here we are… The story kicks off with dad coming home from a business trip with a mantle clock he picked up on the east coast aka. Amityville. He seems very proud of it and immediately unpacks it setting it up in the living room. When no one is looking a little drill pops out of the bottom of the clock and I guess it possesses the house.

Suddenly everyone starts to hallucinate, rooms shift back and forth in time, a neighborhood dog goes bonkers, and evil runs amok! The woman who is in “the know” and could possibly stop things from happening gets “storked” and the ex-girlfriend who was watching his kids ends up doing battle with him and the house to save them. I mean she totally fails but no worries since Amityville 1992 decides to use the old “hey it never happened” trope to reset back to the beginning and lets her prevent it from every happening. You know because time travel and stuff.

How do these movies continually fail? The story is a little better than the previous installment and does have a narrative that you can follow. Things are spaced out evenly and while not a thrill ride it isn’t boring either. I thought that the time travel element was an interesting twist to the story and allowed them to do some world building. But instead of focusing on that we also get a love triangle between the dad, his ex-girlfriend, and her new guy. I did find it amusing that the new boyfriend was played by Jonathan Penner who is best know for being a contestant on survivor. They also write the characters to be very unlikeable. There is no one to root for except maybe the clock. And I can’t stress enough how much I hate the “it never happened trope” which wipes away everything we just watched. I can only think of one movie where it worked, and this isn’t Wishmaster!

Here you have another good cast with Megan Ward, Nita Talbot, Shawn Weatherly, and genre favorite Stephen Macht. Other than Macht, who gets to chew some scenery, they are all wasted with little or nothing of interest to do. Like I’ve already mentioned above the script does them no favors. No matter how professional and talented your cast is they need something on the page to work with. We do get a brief but appreciated Dick Miller sighting though, so that is cool.

The kills are tame, and I have to say that I don’t think that whoever wrote this script has a good understanding how guitar amps work. And while I’ve been fairly negative in my review, I will give the movie credit for the title. It really is about time… heh I made a funny. My final thought before declaring you should not watch Amityville It’s About Time is this. People need to stop going to yard sales at the murder house! That is all. Now onto Amityville: A New Generation.

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

 

The Amityville Curse (1990)

This fifth installment into the Amityville franchise is set in the same town and is tenuously at best connected to the earlier movies. Mostly in the fact that they mention it and that is about all. The story kicks off with a couple looking for an investment property when the woman, who we are led to believe is psychic or at least sensitive, directs them to a different house for sale. We know that this was the home to the local priest who years earlier was shot and killed in the confessional. Seriously this town has some issues!

They buy the house and show up with their friends who also invested to fix it up so they can flip it. We get to see a lot of character development and home improvement stuff. There is also a gag with a nail gun that is okay I suppose. Things get creepy with a disappearing man and his dog. We also have the creepy lady who used to work with the priest showing up with a crucifix and telling them that all will be revealed. Also, there is a spooky basement, plumbing issues, and someone gets their hand cut. Thrilling stuff, right? In the end there is a twist that throws everything into doubt. Was there something supernatural or do we just have a bunch of people with mental health issues? I’m still not sure.

This is the first movie in the franchise that has nothing to do with the house or any haunted item coming from it. Instead, we have a totally different haunting of sorts. Be warned some spoilers are coming so if you don’t like that sort of thing then stop reading. But honestly this is such a terrible movie I’d recommend reading my spoiler and then skipping The Amityville Curse. You have been warned!

The characters seem as bored as I was!

Here is the scoop and what annoyed me about the movie. We are led to believe that there is some force haunting the confessional, which was inexplicably moved to the basement of the house and hidden behind a boarded-up door. But in the end, we find out that one of the people working on the house was the killer of the priest. He has blocked out the memory of what he did and was motivated to do so because he was the priest’s child from an illicit affair. So not a ghost but a mentally unstable guy with daddy issues. Um… okay, I guess. I mean they tried something different and tried to fool the audience. It isn’t so much the twist that annoyed me but the execution of it.

This movie is painfully slow. Nothing happens for the majority of the story as we see people fixing up a house, talking about their issues, and drinking wine. This feels less like a failed attempt at character development and more like they didn’t have enough story to fill up the ninety-minute runtime. I can’t stress enough that except for the last ten or fifteen minutes nothing happens! The sad fact is the cast is solid and The Amityville Curse is shot well.

What is the moral to the story? Have a damn script before rolling the cameras! I can’t recommend this one either. Sooner or later, I have to find an Amityville movie that I really like. I mean the laws of averages would dictate that. Next up is Amityville 1992: It’s About Time.

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

Amityville Horror: The Evil Escapes (1989)

Here we go boys and girls. Time to dive into the fourth movie in the official Amityville franchise. This movie opens with some cars pulling up to a familiar house. The doors open and an army of priests exit. They are there to finally put an end to the evil of the house and as a group start to exorcise the place. One of the priests is injured and while he is in the hospital, we see that the contents of the house are sold at a yard sale. Honestly what sort of nut job would buy something at a haunted yard sale?

An evil looking lamp is purchased and sent from one sister to another as a gag gift. This lamp was how the priest was hurt and he knows that the evil of the house escaped into it. Oh see now the title makes sense. The lamp arrives at a new house on the west coast and starts to haunt the family that lives there. Patty Duke is a recently widowed mother of three who has moved back in with her mom, played by Hollywood Legend Jane Wyatt. Some bad stuff happens, they blame each other, and then finally the priest shows up and the lamp is defeated. Or is it? I think there is an evil cat or something right before the credits roll.

This movie has a solid cast which is totally wasted on a script that meanders pointlessly from one boring scene to another. This is a “spooky” movie that spends more time on how grandma doesn’t approve of how the kids dress then it does on the ghost/demon that is supposedly haunting the family. While Wyatt and Duke are really good actresses, I found their scenes to be flat and honestly didn’t care about the family dynamic. I signed up for a horror movie, not a Hallmark flick where they have to settle their differences so they can live as a happy family unit again.

The above complaint isn’t helped by an utter lack of scares. There is a creepy bit where an arm gets tossed over Duke’s shoulder while she is in bed (supposed to be her dead husband I think) but that is about it. They keep showing us a “scary” face in the lamp that is actually more laugh out loud funny than it is spooky. Plus, it’s a freaking lamp. What could be less scary than a freaking lamp? I guess maybe a clock… Oh hell. Being a made for television movie this also has a lack of gore with a hand in a garbage disposal being about as bloody as it gets. I know that these Amityville movies were never about the blood and guts but give me something to be interested in.

If you haven’t figured it out yet I’m not a fan of Amityville: The Evil Escapes. I had hoped that this far away from the original “true” story they would have finally spent some time coming up with scares and creepy stuff. But I supposed asking that from a ghost/demonic possession flick is asking too much. Pass on this one. Next up is Amityville 5 aka. The Amityville Curse.

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

Featured Post - Amityville marathon

I've been threatening to do this for a while now and I suppose it is time. Despite me swearing that I'd never force myself to sit thru another marathon. The Witchcraft and Camp Blood movies were miserable. But then I realized that they have made a ton of Amityville movies... mostly because you can't trademark the name of a town. 

So how bad could this be? That was a silly question to ask because I didn't realize the volume (almost fifty movies as of the writing of this!) and the familiar directors who would show up. But I've already started so I guess I can't tap out now. Plus I roped my friends from the Bloodbaths and Boomstick's podcast to do it with me. Damn it...

You may notice that the list is kicking off with part four and that the remake isn't included. I'll get around to the first three as well as Ryan Reynold's take on the most famous of haunted houses. I also want to let everyone know that I'm aware that the original story that was supposedly real is completely fake. With that out of the way I might as well jump in. 

Amityville Horror: The Evil Escapes (1989) - This stinker has an excellent cast with Jane Wyman and Patty Duke Astin starring as a mother and daughter with a strained relationship. This isn't helped when an evil lamp is purchased from "the house" and sent to them as a joke. Turns out it isn't very funny. 

The Amityville Curse (1990) - What can I say about this entry? Well I suppose the biggest takeaway is that it is a bait and switch. Come expecting a ghost or maybe demonic possession story and leave with a mediocre tale of a killer with daddy issues. Meh...

Amityville 1992: It's About Time (1992) - I guess if we have a lamp then a clock can also "contain" the evil of the Amityville house. This one has a great cast that is totally wasted on this mess of a movie. It also leans heavily on a narrative trick that I hate. Click above to see the entire review. 

Amityville: A New Generation (1993) - So far we have had a haunted lamp and a haunted clock. Why not a haunted mirror that makes it's way to the west coast to bring the evil to an artists commune. Actually I'm sort of okay with the ghosts killing these hipsters. Still not a good movie. 

Amityville Dollhouse (1996) - Let us run thru the list again. We have had a lamp, clock, and mirror. Is it that big of a stretch to see a dollhouse made in the image of that "famous" haunted house also being possessed by evil? Despite being terribly cheesy or maybe because of it I didn't hate this one. 

The Amityville Haunting (2011) - After a lengthy hiatus someone realized that you could slap the name Amityville on your movie and not have to pay anyone. Of course the filmmakers that jumped first decided to do a found footage flick. Well this is going to suck... 

The Amityville Asylum (2013) - Well they decided to shoot an Amityville movie in England while trying to sell it as being made in America. Spoilers... it doesn't work. The story is boring and the acting just awful. Seems par for the course with these Amityville flicks.

Amityville Death House (2015) - If there is a no budget franchise it is only a matter of time before Mark Polonia is going to try his hand at one. The fact that Fred Olen Ray produced and I had hope for this one. I shouldn't have. Bad CGI and an overly ambitious story kills it. 

Amityville Playhouse (2016) - Well they shot an Amityville movie with England trying to be passed off as New York state so why not Canada? In fact why not just reference Amityville in our own crappy cultist worshipping Native American demonic spirit movie? This is yet another turkey...

Amityville Toybox (2016) - Every God Damn time I do one of these marathons I end up running into a Dustin Ferguson flick! I suppose since we have already had a haunted lamp, clock, mirror, and dollhouse there might as well be an evil toy monkey. 

The Amityville Terror (2016) - This is less of an Amityville ghost story and more of an evil real estate lady having sex in a commercial kitchen flick! Honestly it isn't a good movie but compared to some of the other Amityville flicks I've watched for this marathon it is okay... I suppose. 

Amityville No Escape (2016) - I had some hope for this entry and I wasn't disappointed. It comes from one of my favorite independent filmmakers working today, Henrique Couto, and he brought us a found footage entry that had an interesting plot with some twists I dug. 

Amityville Evil Never Dies (2017) - After two installments that I didn't mind so much the franchise gets back to the crappy stuff with this installment from Dustin Ferguson. Sort of a sequel to Toybox this movie ignores everything from that except they recycle the evil monkey. God Damn it...

Amityville Exorcism (2017) - Time for Mark Polonia to toss his hat back into the ring for another bite at the Amityville apple. This time there is a haunted 2 x 4... I kid you not. Oh and it possesses someone so they can do their own budget Exorcist rip off. 

Amityville Prison (2017) - Here we go again with a movie that was clearly never intended to be part of the Amityville franchise having the name slapped on it. This time a bunch of friends go to a prison to shoot a show about fear and being scared. They run into meth dealers that turn out to be aliens. Not a ghost to be seen and not one person mentions Amityville. 

Amityville: The Awakening (2017) - Sweet baby Jeebus they made an Amityville movie that I really dig. There is a good cast on screen, a decent company behind the production, and most importantly a story with a twist that I didn't see coming. This is by far the most fun I've had with any of these movies in a while. 

Amityville: Mt. Misery Rd. (2018) - Well the franchise followed up one of the best entries with this garbage. It is awful and pointless. This is more of a home movie where a dude shows off his wife's buttocks instead of making a movie with a plot and characters. Lovely as she is this is a miserable waste of time. 

Note: I need to take a break from these movies. They are beginning to wear on me but I will be back with more reviews in a couple of months. Have no fear I'll watch and review all of these... even if it kills me!

The Amityville Murders (2018) - I'm back at the marathon. Quite by accident I ended up with one of the worst examples of scumbag filmmakers trying to cash in on the actual murders. These assholes even use actual crime scene photos with dead children in a montage! WTF?

Amityville Island (2020) - Mark Polonia weighs back in with this mess of a movie. There is some reference to the haunted items from the house... but then it goes all mad scientist on us. Something about spawning super soldiers from prisoners... meh. 

Note: You may have noticed that I skipped Amityville Vibrator (2020). Sadly I didn't skip watching it. Not only is it the same lousy quality as many of these flicks it is straight up porn. Not good porn either. Just a crappy movie where some ladies stick things in places quite graphically in your face. If you must know it is garbage you don't need to watch. 

Amityville Witches (2021) - This is a movie about witches doing battle with other witches. One side is bad and the other side is good. They stand across from each other wiggling fingers and going pew pew pew... okay that last bit might have just been in my head. 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

Mad Cow (2010)

This movie kicks off with a woman blowing up a cow man or maybe a cow man zombie with an explosive sausage link. Well movie you have my attention! The opening credits roll with a Masterpiece Theater style page flipping sequence. Again, that is pretty funny. After the credits we see a cat jump scare followed closely with a clown jump scare/gag. Then the chef who was the victim of these is killed by someone or something. I mean given the name of the movie I’m going to assume the perpetrator is bovine in nature.

Our main characters are Charlize, a woman who works at a resort in the South African bush… heh that pays off in a really funny joke later. Also working there is detective Vince Chopper and his partner. They are undercover to investigate a mad scientist who works at a nearby company. This is the same scientist that creates the monster which goes on the killing spree. It is up to Vince and Charlize to stop the monster and all the zombified human cow hybrids it creates. Not sure how that last one works into the story, but it doesn’t matter that much.

Mad Cow is an insanely funny movie. Almost every scene has some sort of pun or joke as a payoff. Most of them land and many are set up (like the already mentioned South African bush) far ahead of time. From animal sounds that are clearly just people meowing, croaking, and growling to Vince’s inability to correctly identify the most basic animals of the surrounding bush the movie is funny. Two of my favorites are the pole dancer who is a polish guy dancing around in a I Love Warsaw t-shirt. The other is a bit spicier with Charlize on the phone petting the cat that just came in from the rain. When asked what she is doing she replies, “Just stroking my wet…” well I think you can fill in the rest. These are just a couple examples of the many jokes that had me cracking up.

This is a monster movie, so I suppose we need to talk about the special effects. There are some kills including a cleaver to the face and a chainsaw thru the torso. These are great but given the tiny budget (apparently less than fifty thousand) they are impressive. The titular mad cow is funny and is just a dude in a suit. That seems entirely appropriate for this flick. They also do a decent job with the various infected/zombie humans. Again, it isn’t elaborate but given the budget and the fact that this is a comedy I was fine with what I saw.

I sit thru a lot of bad independent movies to review for the site. That is doubly so when they are supposed to be horror comedies. Being funny is much harder to pull off then being gross, but Mad Cow does an excellent job. This is one that I can recommend without hesitation. Find yourself a copy and get ready for ninety minutes of laughs.

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer

Teenage Monster (1957)

I’ve spent most of my life tracking down and watching every fifties monster movie available. Somehow, I keep finding new to me flicks which is what keeps me excited about this hobby and always on the lookout for new to me stuff. Teenage Monster is one of those that I recently stumbled over.

It is eighteen eighty and we meet a family struggling to get their gold mine to pay off. There is Ma, Pa, and their young son Charley. After a brief introduction we see a meteor hit the mine killing Pa and mutating Charley. He has a terrible scar on his face which is how we realize thru a helpful onscreen prompt that seven years have passed he is now the large hairy bigfoot looking creature. If his incredible strength and childlike mind aren’t dangerous enough, he also has an anger issue and overreacts to stress. The rest of the movie is him killing random folks until he grabs a girl named Kathy. She seems nice but manipulates him into doing some killing for her. But Charley isn’t stupid just naive and eventually he figures things out. The only way his Ma can be happy and free is for him to go. Since she is blackmailing Ma, he takes Kathy with him!

Not only is this a new to me fifties monster movie but it is also a western! I was a little disappointed that we didn’t get as much cowboy action as Charley sneaks around and stays in the shadows. But then they also establish that while he is very strong, he isn’t immune to a Winchester rifle. So, I guess that it would have been a much shorter movie. Though it does only clock in at a little over an hour which makes for a briskly paced bit of cheesy fun. The story wastes little time before getting the ball rolling. The bodies start to drop rather quickly as Charley smashes anyone he finds… well most everyone. When he meets Kathy, he kidnaps her and brings her home to have a friend. I also think he gets a bit of a crush on her. This leads up to a neat bit of messing with our expectations when Kathy turns out to be not so innocent and immediately becomes a villain. I didn’t see that coming and appreciated it.

The cast is solid and filled with working character actors and “B” list faces that you will have seen before. The highlight for me was seeing Gloria Castillo as Kathy. She is one of my favorites from the fifties for her performance in Invasion of the Saucermen. Anne Gwynne is Ma and appeared in House of Frankenstein as well as Murder in the Blue Room which I need to cover during my next mystery marathon. Like I said there is some talent here and they give it their all.

The thing that most surprised me about Teenage Monster was how well they did with the creature design. It basically looks like bigfoot in clothes, but it works. They use some forced perspective and platform boots to make the monster look larger than he is which I love. Old school Hollywood tricks are still the best in my book. The killings aren’t explicit, but then this is a fifties flick so you wouldn’t expect them to be. Basically, he strangles or pounds his victims until they die.

This was a fun way to kill an hour. You get a sympathetic monster, a scheming villain, some comeuppance in the end, and sort of a happy ending as Ma, while sad, is finally free to continue her life. They put a lot of effort into what many would have considered a throwaway “B” picture. I appreciate that and recommend everyone check out Teenage Monster.

 

© Copyright 2022 John Shatzer