Solo Rreview: From Beyond (1986)

Cast Members of Note- The awesome Jeffrey Combs and Ken Foree, and the ever hot Barbara Crampton.

From Beyond is basically about an creepy old doctor who likes to tie women up and abuse them, using them to find a way to access the hidden world of flesh-hungry creatures that constantly surrounds us. Of course it turns him into some sort of literal sex-monster, and despite his otherworldly change, he never loses his horny demeanor with the ladies.

The ladies love this guy.

Enter a sexually repressed brain doctor/author who is really hot, a nerdy and terrorized scientist, and a sassy black Cop, and all hell breaks loose! By "all hell" I mean she gets very horny and tries to have sex with everyone... even the nerd, after he nearly gets sucked half to death by some nether-creature, and ends up looking like a half-sucked white Milk Dud.

I won't ruin the ending for you here, but trust me when I say that a giant-sized evil penis nearly ruins everyone's day.

Half-sucked Milk Dud.

You have to love H.P. Lovecraft; the guy had some crazy ideas about things, and I'll be damned if he doesn't have us wondering about a universe full of Elder Gods that we humans aren't advanced enough to see. From Beyond lets us see what H.P. wanted us to believe, and it does so in glorious fashion. Jeffrey Combs is great in this one as usual, as is Ken Foree. Sure they're B-movie character guys, but to us Horror fans, they're legends. Speaking of legends, did it get any hotter than Barbara Crampton in the 80's? Nope. It did not.

This movie is fun, bloody, interesting, and bizarre all at once, and we love it to death. 

She so turns into a super-whore in this one.

Honestly, the worst part about this movie is that I wish it had been longer. It really was that good.

"Did you say... longer?"

The bat/bird/dragon/winged demon thing. LOL Some of the FX in this one were 80's bad.

TONS of blood and gore for those of us that like it to flow heavy. The Directors Cut Blu-ray/DVD even has the "eyeball sucking scene" put back into the movie, and that jsut makes the whole thing extra nasty... In a good way of course.

Oh, that sucks. Sucks... get it? Nevermind.

Barbara Crampton for the win! She is a bad, bad girl in this, and she shows her goods-a-plenty.

"Ok, I'll try it, but are you sure it's gonna fit?"

"It... ate... him!" or "That will be enough of that."

H.P. Lovecraft was a creepy and brilliant dude. Also, always listen to the scientist when he tells you "no."

"Stop being a whore!"

One of only two Lovecraft flicks that has ever been really good (the other being Re-Animator), From Beyond is a unique viewing experience to say the least. It's crazy, it's erotic, it's full of slimy gore, and it's just fun as hell.

This is one of the best Horror flicks of the 80's (or any decade), and you absolutely need to have it in your collection.

A

From Beyond is available now on Blu-ray, DVD, and VOD.

Barbara Crampton is crazy hot... especially in leather.

Coming Soon- Dead Girl (2009)

The more I hear/read about this, the more intrigued I am; There's no trailer yet, but with TIFF right around the corner, I'm sure the net will be flooded with early reviews. Until then, the premise has me wanting more.
 
I sense danger. "A horror/thriller about two teenagers who make a shocking discovery that not only threatens their friendship but also their lives. In a forgotten room of an abandoned asylum, they find a beautiful woman tied to a bed, and soon come to realize she is anything but dead." "Shiloh Fernandez (RED) and Noah Segan (CABIN FEVER 2) portray high school stoners who ditch school in favor of drinking beer in an abandoned sanitarium. The pair make their way into the bowels of the building, and stumble across a vicious dog. The ensuing chase leads them to a barricaded door. Upon entering the adjoining room, they find an incapacitated woman wrapped in plastic and strapped to a table. As time passes, the teens make a series of questionable decisions that put them, their friends and the audience on the spot."
 
I don't trust her.

Review #20- The Brood (1979)

In Attendance- Me, Eryn, and The Vanilla Gorilla.
Cast Members of Note- Oliver Reed, Samantha Eggar, Art Hindle.

The Brood is a prequel to Kramer vs. Kramer; it shows us the pitfalls of divorce, and just how hard it all can be on the kids...  especially if the kids in question are mongoloid mutants born from tumor-like stomach sacs.

Kill them with fire!

When a good, caring husband and father realizes that his wife is insane, he sends her off to the hospital for shock treatment, and maybe a lobotomy; what she gets instead is a radical new therapy that makes her even more insane, and turns her into a mutant baby-maker with absolutely no sense of humor.

"Behold, my tumor-child!"

When the her Chud-Children start killing people at their Mother's emotional whims, it isn't long before they want to kill their little sister too, and just because she's a normal human being! I can't stand intolerance.

Far be it from me to ruin the ending for you here, but suffice it to say that dad strangles mom to death.

What did she ever do to anybody? Huh?

This movie is a Horror Classic in many ways. It gets into your head and ssubtly messes with you on a subconscious level, while hitting you with shocking, visceral terror all in the same stroke. It's a creepy and disturbing breath of fresh air. The Terror Tykes are quite something to behold.

This movie is a prime example of why the late 70's/early 80's was one of the best periods in Horror history; people actually made films that explored new ideas instead of retreading the same old ground. Cronenberg's "Body Horror" flicks are a prime example of that.

There are actually some people out there (you know who you are!) who claim that this movie is too slow in the pace department, but you know what? Those people can go watch fucking Scream, and shut the hell up. God forbid that you allow tension to build, and replace jump scares with mood and atmosphere. You know what, don't go watch Scream, just go jump off of your roof.

"I always feel like, somebody's watching meeeeee...."

Every time I get so much as a mosquito bite I think that "Psychoplasmics" has finally got a hold on me. Fucking David Cronenberg.

I'm with you, kid.

Why did she have to die?

She totally would have slept with him too...

 

This one delivers the crimson goods; mutant kids bashing people to death with mallets, bloody infant licking, deformed body birth... there's plenty of Cronenberg-esque nastiness on display here, which is very appropriate, being that this is a Cronenberg film.

A Mother's love knows no bounds.

Just the body of a dead mutant kid, but that doesn't count.

"Thirty seconds after you're born you have a past and sixty seconds after that you begin to lie to yourself about it." or "Damn kids."

If Cronenberg teaches us nothing else, it's that we are our own worst enemy, and that our bodies are out to destroy us. Also, all women are apparently insane. Also, Cronenberg has issues, and since he's Canadian, that means all Canadians have issues too.

Only in Canada...

The Brood is a masterpiece. Cronenberg's work in the 70's and 80's made statements and forced the audience to ask themselves some hard questions, and The Brood is no exception. You must have this movie in your collection.

A+ 

The Brood is available now on DVD and VOD.

My mom gives this movie to me on DVD every Christmas; she saves it until last, and stares at me like Samantha Eggar (see pic below) until I open it. Once my tears begin to flow, she starts to laugh and runs off into the attic. I think she's trying to tell me something.
 

DVD Review: The Boogeyman (1980)

In Attendance- Me, Eryn, The Vanilla Gorilla and Nick (although he ran off not far into the movie.)
Cast Members of Note- John Carradine (this was not his career high point.)

A little boy that is tired of his mothers incessant whoring around (including tying him to the bed so that she can scrump), stabs her nylon-faced lover to death while she's scrumping him. FYI: his sister only watched him do it, so she's the pure one I guess.

"Ignore my kids and bang me!"

Well, Junior grows up to be a mute creep, strangling his sisters friends and painting mirrors black, but everyone seems to think he's just "quiet." Like any of us would do, the sister returns to her childhood home to face her fears, and break things that don't belong to her in the process; including the mirror which has been in the house since that fateful night, and still contains the ghost of the guy her brother killed.

So, ghosts like to lay around a lot?

Luckily, her moron husband decides to take it home, and the vengeful spirit follows them and starts killing random people... and really, no more needs to be said. I mean, when a shard of glass stuck to a kids foot casts that "sun-filled mirror reflection thing" across and entire lake, thus killing the campers that were "shined upon," I just want things to be over.

Ooh, scary!

This isn't the worst Horror movie ever or anything, but it certainly isn't very good either. There are some decent kills in this one, but the movie as a whole is a big mess. Ulli Lommel isn't much of a director; in fact, he's a bit of an old school Uwe Boll if you ask me, and it shows. I don't have much good to say about this one, so I guess this section is done.

She was pretty cute, so that's a good thing.

This shitty movie somehow spawned two sequels... and I can't imagine that anyone honestly gives a shit.

"Director's Cut" means using footage from part 1 for half of part 2. Ugh.

The retarded little brother screaming "Boogeyman!" every chance he got, was truly annoying. *Special thanks to the window for snapping his neck.

"I'm going to throw you down this fucking well."

This one's got aome decent kill scenes involving scissors-to-throat, a double mouth impaling, pitchfork violence, and a nice scene with a kid stabbing a guy to death.

Scream "Boogeyman!" now, asshole.

Nothing more than a quick flash of boob... although there were some fairly suggestive scenes throughout.

That's right baby, cut it all off!

"Thank god it's fucking over!" Wait, that was me who said that...

Oh, Ulli...

The 70's & 80's took their fair share of cinematic shits, especially in the Horror genre, and Ulli Lommel was responsible for at least half of them (or close enough.)

So that's how it is in their family...

Boogeyman is a cheap, shlocky slasher, that has some pretty good ideas going for it, but is just too cheesy to be very effective. I say you watch it if it's on TV or something, but just don't expect too much from it.

D

The Boogeyman is available now on DVD and VOD.

So, the star of Boogeyman, the pretty-hot Suzanna Love, was apparently a DuPont heiress who was not only married to director Ulli Lommel, but financed most of his films. Sounds like a pretty good deal for him.

Nice catch, Ulli.