LOST BOYS (1987)

A classic clip:

Non-Horror Movie People Who Scare Me #2 - Private Leonard 'Gomer Pyle' Lawrence, Platoon 3092

Oh dear. It would be very unwise to provoke this man.

The Fly (1986)

Day #478

Time flies. Especially when you're having as much fun as I am in this GODFORSAKEN HELLHOLE!

But it's not all bad. Much excitement was to be had today as I discovered a small door in the igloo, previously hidden behind the TV set! I made my way through it and appeared in another igloo!! Very strange. What's more, when I left this igloo I noticed another lone igloo in the distance. I realise that I'm saying 'igloo' too much so I'll keep it brief...

... walking towards it, I started to feel that it was... familiar somehow (and I'm sure regular readers will have the same familiar feeling) and lo and behold it was! It was my own igloo! Igloo of the Uncanny!!

Seems like I've stumbled upon some sort of teleportation device. And a completely useless one if I'm not much mistaken, so I boarded up the door in my own igloo, and firebombed the other igloo until it melted completely. There's only room for one igloo in this force-field and it wasn't that one. There wasn't an uncanny thing about it. Except for the fact that I'd never noticed it before, come to think of it...

THE FLY (1986)



The 1986 remake of The Fly resonates with familiar Crononbergian themes of science run amok, loss of control, disease, technology and mutating bodies - themes that any horror blogger worth their salt would have a field day examining and exploring.

Right then, let's talk about Jeff Goldblum's stupid 80's mullet.



To be fair to him, it was the 80's. And if you happen to see a photograph of him now he looks perfectly presentable. But watching The Fly now, and seeing 80's Jeff with his mullet and jacket sleeves rolled up to the elbows is not an experience for the faint-hearted. Neither is this mis-judged teaser poster that focused on the common housefly's less appealing toilet habits:



It's not just Jeff's looks that grab your attention of course - it's his unique way of delivering lines. So unique that I can't understand a word he says in anything he does. Whenever I watch Jeff Goldblum in a film he looks like someone rehearsing his lines to himself before the actual take. Perhaps, as I write this, there are vaults full of film canisters containing the 'correct takes' that were filmed just after the ones we've been enduring all these years. 'correct takes' where he is speaking in a voice louder than Brian Blessed, enunciating every syllable as clearly as Rex Harrison.

Come to think of it that's pretty unlikely - if these legendary 'correct takes' ever existed surely Jeff himself would have said something by now? Although maybe he did, and nobody understood what he saying.

Anyway. Jeff Goldblum is Brundle, a brilliant scientist who lives in one of those semi-derelict loft/warehouse spaces that only people in 80's films ever live in. He invites Veronica (Geena Davis) back to his place one night and, as brilliant scientists do, gets his pod out. After doing a neat teleportation trick, he is alarmed to discover that Veronica is a reporter after a scoop! He throws her out / meets her again / falls in love / gets her pregnant / turns into a fly / gets his head blown off.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. There's another man in Veronica's life who has the best beard I've ever seen, and the best name I've ever heard.

Meet Stathis Borans.



Stathis is a great character who spends the entire film asking Veronica for a shag. The only time he doesn't ask her for a shag is when she's having an abortion. But then, this is a dream sequence so it doesn't really count. In fact, it was Stathis's lack of asking Veronica for a shag that clued me up to the fact that it was a dream sequence. Stathis is a complete tosser but interestingly, becomes a bit of a bloody hero by the end of the film.

Long before the hero bit though, we see him sneaking around Veronica's place and taking showers just for the hell of it. It's not a completely random piece of shower-taking because we discover they used to be in a relationship, and it would appear that Stathis has paid a visit to wind her up and show that he still very much has the hots for Veronica. Albeit in a creepy stalkerish way. He was probably waiting for hours in the shower before Veronica turns up. He may even have had a look through her underwear drawer. I know I would.

The next time we see Stathis he's gone off the rails even more, and is in a rage because of Veronica and Brundle's blossoming relationship. This leads to him confronting Veronica in a store with a great line, "I followed you - Psychology Today my ass!"

And he follows it up with another cracker. When Veronica explains that she's only spending time with Brundle because she's "finally onto something that's big. Huge!" he replies - quick as a flash, mind - "What, like his cock?" This is a genius response, but unfortunately it does have the effect of making Jeff Goldblum's cock spring up in your mind. A long and thin one, surely.

Ok, less cock more action - flushed with the success of teleporting a live baboon, Brundle gets pished and teleports himself.



Unfortunately it turns out he's left a fly undone, and it has disastrous consequences... as you'd expect, if you're watching a horror film called 'The Fly'.

It's not just his cock that Brundle has to start worrying about. All manner of disgusting and repulsive things start happening to his body and in a rather icky bathroom scene he finds that his teeth and fingernails are falling off. There is also some pus involved.

Soon, Jeff Goldblum has disappeared completely underneath some fantastically hideous make-up. I'm not having a sly dig at Jeff, but only when he is completely unrecognisable does the film become really enjoyable to watch, as it moves up a gear into a full-blown work of Cronenbergian terror.

"I'm an insect who dreamt he was a man and loved it.But the dream is over...and the insect is awake."

The final showdown is terrific, as Brundle returns with pregnant Veronica to his warehouse loft apartment to find it completely empty, burgled by local hoods who took advantage of him never locking the doors.

Not true, of course! Brundle returns with pregnant Veronica to his warehouse loft apartment full of his teleportation gear to fulfil his scheme of creating the perfect family by fusing them altogether. Okay, so not a great idea but he has been under a lot of pressure.

Luckily, Stathis is there and this time he's not in the mood for a shower - he's packing a shotgun! And despite getting a hand and foot melted by Brundle's stomach acid...



...(bet that hurt) he manages to shoot one of the teleporters and mess it up enough for Veronica to be freed unharmed, and for Brundle to emerge looking like a bag of shit - fused with the teleport and all sorts of other stuff that wasn't in his happy family plan. He's put out of his misery by a shotgun blast from Veronica. Stathis only has time to ask Veronica for a quick shag before the credits roll.

So there you have it. Turns out that man shouldn't play God, which is pretty obvious when you think about it. I'm surprised nobody's mentioned it before...

As a final treat, here's one of those mad Polish posters:

TOP 5 LINES THAT WOULD HAVE FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGED THE COURSE OF AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON...

1. "Ah, Italy! Aren't you glad we started here and not England? And look - there's Debbie!"

2. "What's the 5-pointed star on the wall for you say? Buy us a drink and I'll tell you lads, it's a cracking story!"

2. "Damn, missed the board again, I'm always doing that! It's these darts, the flights on them are well dodgy.."

4. "I should kill myself, Jack? Right you are then, have that other piece of toast while I jump out this hospital windo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o..."

5. "You want to come back and stay with me in my nurses flat? Get lost you nutter! How do you even know my name?"

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

Day #1325


Right. Where was I?

Down a crevice, that's where. After a climb that must have taken me 2 months, I emerged from the darkness only to be set upon by some sort of madman... or a monster!

When I awoke from what felt like a 10-day coma, my wounds had been cleaned and I was lying safe and snug, back in the igloo. Weird. And then, right on queue, the TV crackles into life and a film appears...


AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON (1981)



This isn't the first time I've watched American Werewolf in London. It's my favourite horror film, so I've seen it a lot since my first viewing aged 11. Back then, armed with a clunky VHS recorder and a taped copy of the film, I learned to recite all the dialogue (this was before puberty kicked in). But don't worry, I'm not going to do that today...

And I'm not going to review the film either - we've all seen it, and if you haven't then go and watch it now....back? Good. What I'm going to do now is ask - and attempt to answer - 5 long-lost legendary American Werewolf questions. These questions fill my waking hours and sleepless nights here in Igloo-Land. These questions may not have been asked before. Some of them may not even have an answer. But these questions are important...

1. Boy, could they play darts?













"You, made me mis-s-s-s... I've never missed that board before."

So just how good is this guy? He's never missed a dartboard in his life? Does that sound likely? Well, no it doesn't. But let's listen to what he says again, "I've never missed that board before...". So who's to say that he's not referring to a new dartboard that The Slaughtered Lamb had installed a couple of days ago? We'll have to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Okay, let's have a look at how well he plays the game...

We see him hit the bullseye in the first shot of the board, having already hit 14 and 18. That makes 50 (bull) + 14 + 18 = 82, and every good darts player knows that for an 82 finish, you’d go for the bull first of all. Which he may have done, judging from the fact that the 14 is so close to the bullseye. But that would have left him 68 in which case he’d probably have gone 18, bullseye… ah - which actually he did. So I'm going to have to say yes - he could play darts.

My only minor gripe would be that Jack's question - about the 5-pointed star - that apparently made him mis-s-s that board, was asked as the entire pub was laughing hysterically at the Alamo joke. So the darts player must have been lining up his shot as the whole pub was erupting with laughter. Surely he should have waited for a bit of quiet until he played his shot? And as Jack's question did actually quieten the pub down almost instantly, he wouldn't have had to wait long. With a little bit more common sense, and a little bit more patience, his run of 'never having missed that board before' could have continued much longer. Something to think about for all potential darts players out there...

2. How are you supposed to 'beware the moon'?



"Beware the moon, lads!"

Come on, just what is anyone supposed to with that piece of advice? Beware the moon - okay thanks Brian, I’ll keep away from it if I see it, shall I?

It’s useless advice almost on a par with "Beware the Ides of March” given to Julius Caesar. How do you beware a date, in the name of (the unvanquished) god?

I’d also argue that the "Stay off the moors, stick to the road!" comments given to the lads would have been equally useless in the event of a werewolf attack. We see the road later, and there are no fences, no nothing between it and the moors. Unless there's an ancient part of werewolf mythology that says werewolves can't go on roads, then it would seem that David and Jack are in deep shit the minute they leave the Slaughtered Lamb, no matter how many pieces of local wisdom they remembered.

I tell you what would have been useful though – letting Jack and David STAY IN THE PUB. Just what was their unforgivable faux pas? So they asked what an unusual feature on the wall was. Big deal. It was a fair enough question, and one that everyone in the pub should have been half expecting and have an answer prepared - why not go with the barmaid’s fairly plausible excuse later in the film – that it was a 200 year old feature and nobody know what it means? But no! Better to go into a state of shock and condemn a couple of nice young men to their deaths.

3. How hard is a madman?



The first time Dr. Hirsch sees David he explains how lucky he was to survive the attack because 'they say a madman has the strength of ten'.

So why don't either Dr.Hirsch or David mention this a short time later when they hear Sergeant McManus comment to Inspector Villiers that "Two strong boys would be able to defend themselves against one man..."?

Could it be that Dr. Hirsch didn't actually have any idea what he was talking about? Just how much strength does a madman actually have?

Well, my extensive research into this subject (10 minutes on Google and Wikipedia) has failed to come up with a satisfactory answer. Based on those wasted minutes, I'm going concur that Dr. Hirsch is talking out of his over-qualified arse, and that Sergeant McManus was correct. But then, we knew that all along didn't we?


4. Was nurse Alex Price mentally disturbed?



Time has been kind to nurse Alex Price, and we all remember her as the innocent heroine, fighting against the forces of darkness for the soul of her lover. But is she really whiter-than-white? Could she even be mentally disturbed herself? Let's examine her behaviour in detail:

She takes a disturbed patient back to her flat and has sex with him because she finds him a 'little bit sad'. She threatens a child patient by asking if he's ever been severely beaten about the face and neck. She rents a large flat in a prime location in London that must cost more than she gets paid. She cracks up laughing when her disturbed lover tells her he's seen a vision of his dead friend, and to cap it all she ends up committing bestiality by telling a werewolf that's about to bite her head off that she loves it...

Not such an angel now, is she?

5. Why didn't Jack go to pieces sooner?













We see Jack decompose throughout the film, from being a 'fresh kill' in the hospital to a skeleton in the porn theatre. The idea being that he's decomposing as he would have in real life. But hang on just a minute...

David's been in a coma for 10 days. So when Jack first appears shouldn't he look like a 10 day old corpse? And not, as he does, freshly slaughtered with that little dangly flap of skin on his neck. Furthermore, the time from his appearance in the hospital to the porn theatre is only a day or two, which is way too short to turn into a skeleton.

Of course, all the above could be explained by Jack being a figment of David's imagination. But then, that's another question - perhaps one that I'll ask in a future post dealing with question numbers 6 to 10... like, was The Slaughtered Lamb a real ale pub? Was Debbie Klein really mediocre? Did Dr. Hirsch's receptionist really tell Roger Mathison that he'd died from an old war wound??

Until then... stay on the moors, lads... stay on the moors.

Stay off the moors. Sorry.

Edgar Wright on An American Werewolf in London

Blast! I've been stuck down a crevice for the last 4 months. Almost at the top now though, Igloo fans! In the meantime, here's a guest reviewer:

BASKET CASE (1982)

Day #45

You know, lying on my bunk listen to the wind moan endlessly outside the igloo, I often think about who might be reading these very scribblings.

What about you, reader? Do you have the time to listen to me whine about nothing and everything all at once?

I am one of those melodramatic fools. Neurotic to the bone, no doubt about it!

Sometimes, I give myself the creeps. Sometimes my mind plays tricks on me.It all keeps adding up. I think I'm cracking up - am I just paranoid?

Anyway, enough of such musings. Here comes a completely unrelated and unexpected film:

BASKET CASE (1982)

As Basket Case ends, the only possible reaction is to laugh incomprehensibly, shake your head and say “What the f…?” quietly to yourself. It’s essential viewing for any sicko. Any depraved and semi-intelligent mind. Any murderous, cretinous individual. I loved it.

Sure, there’s no budget (there’s an in-joke that the roll of cash that belongs to our hero Duane was the film’s entire budget), the acting is piss-poor and some of the stop-motion special effects look like they could have been made by a 6-month old Ray Harryhausen – BUT! To compensate, we’ve got enough imagination, passion, wit and outright depravity to make it the classic that is.

Duane Bradley turns up at the Broslin Hotel, with a fabulously post-punk mop of hair and checks into room 7 for a 'few days'. I almost forgot – he’s carrying a wicker basket. What’s in the basket?

It’s the soul of Marsellus Wallace!

Only joking. It’s his Siamese twin. A hideous mutant.

And together, they’re gonna get medieval on the asses of the group of doctors that performed the operation to detach them!

Luckily, Duane’s brother is incredibly bloodthirsty and pretty nimble for a… for his height, and in no time at all, blood is flowing thick and fast and the bodies are mounting up.

Unluckily, Duane’s brother is also pretty hard to control. And the guests and managers of The Broslin Hotel aren’t too happy with his room-trashing, moon-howling and guest-murdering antics.

In between plotting his revenge, Duane finds time for a little romance as he catches the eye of the ladies. And it's great to see that the women in Basket Case are fabulously chunky. Without exception they’re all carrying some extra poundage which has the strange effect of making them woman shaped and not like skinny adolescent boys. Modern film-makers take note. Woman have curves. What I’m trying to say is:


The end comes all too soon, when Duane’s brother wanders off to find Duane’s love interest Sharon. He creeps into her room and does something fairly unspeakable to her. This puts a terrible strain on the brothers’ relationship. A strain that leaves both of them dangling from the Hotel Broslin sign… is it too late to make amends? Will brotherly love overcome adversity?

Yes and no. They fall and die.

Or. Do. They?

Trailer:

THE STUFF (1985)

Day #313

Another blizzard.

The same blizzard.

Snow, driving snow, nothing but snow - relentless white, white, white stuff seeping into my very consciousness and driving me insane! Hellish white, White WHITE torment!

I need something to take my mind of this never ending horror...

THE STUFF (1985)



Soylent Green meets The Blob in this wonderful horror film directed by the great Larry Cohen (Q: The Winged Serpent etc.).

Or, imagine if Ed Wood Jnr. had tried to turn a John Grisham novel into a film… then you’d have The Stuff!

But what is The Stuff? It’s the new dessert sensation sweeping the world. It looks harmless enough, tastes great – but is it all just a little too good to be true?

Michael Moriarty (a Cohen favourite and rightly so) plays Mo - a good ol’ Southern boy Industrial Spy who isn’t as dumb as he makes out. He’s hired by The Stuff's competition to discover the secret of The Stuff, and so teams up with the beautiful Nicole who works for the Stuff's advertising campaign (and what a great campaign it is, with a song so catchy and addictive you won’t be able to get enough of it. Very apt), and a young kid Jason, who is the only one (for some reason) that has twigged the secret of The Stuff and has escaped (by pretending to eat shaving foam - don’t ask) from his Stuff-crazed family, including a spookily-eyebrowed brother who is a dead ringer for a vamped up Danny Glick. More than enough reason to run from any home.



Oh, and there’s also Chocolate Chip Charlie as Himself.

Our small team of good guys go investigating, and have a few close calls with The Stuff before eventually teaming up with Pauly from Goodfellas, who plays Colonel Malcolm Grommett Spears, leader of the free resistance – and a bit of a nutter - down in Atlanta.

A thrilling final showdown sees Mo, Pauly and co. do battle with The Stuff and various nameless Stuff henchmen. Spoiler ahead – they win! The world (the U.S.) is free!

The Stuff (the film, not The Stuff itself) is wonderful. A biting satire on the nature of rampant consumerism if you’re being generous, a completely ridiculous b-movie if you’re not. Either way it’s absolutely essential viewing. But be warned! One sitting may not be enough!!! < Cue The Stuff advertising song. Repeat to fade>

THE FOG (1980)

Day #44.
Rations dwindling.
One packet of stale water biscuits and a few cans of Bully Beef dated November '10.

Which doesn't sound too bad until you notice the "By Royal Appointment of His Majesty King Edward VII" printed next to it.

So - I decide to brave the outdoors on a foraging expedition. Curse my luck! Within minutes I'm stuck in fog of unholy thickness. And to my sphincter-loosening horror I discover I've lost sight of the igloo!

Eventually, praise be to God - I manage to stumble back upon it. I enter, somewhat chastened by my ordeal - for I was perilously close to having been lost forever to that accursed fog!

No sooner had I settled down however, when once again the TV crackles into life! I ready myself to note any clues. Doing so may even help take my mind off my narrow escape in that damned fog...

THE FOG (1980)


The Fog is an absolute masterclass in creating tension and suspense. A feeling of creeping dread is palpable throughout. And it's all because of these 5 SCARY THINGS ABOUT THE FOG:

1. STEVIE WAYNE’S VOICE ON THE RADIO

That throaty, smoky, croaky drawl is an integral and unforgettable part of the movie. Yes, I know she’s on our side but that voice kinda creeps me out. It’s sexy, but sinister as well, in the way that… Madonna showing off her biceps is. I reckon that if The Fog itself had a voice, it would sound exactly like Stevie Wayne. Come to think of it, has Stevie Wayne and The Fog ever been seen in the same room together?? It’s worth investigating. No doubt the ratings on her radio show shot up after the 'fog' show, so would it be stretching the bounds of credibility for them to be in league together?

2. TOM ATKINS' ENORMOUS HEAD

Once again, I know he’s on our side, but Tom Atkins' unfeasibly large head has always freaked me out. It’s enormous. Like an orange on a tooth-pick. It’s like he’s wearing a paper mache mask of his own face. Why would anyone want to do that? What possible motives could he have? That’s what freaks me out about him.

3. THE MUSIC
John Carpenter is – or was at least – the absolute master in creating these sinister synth soundtracks signalling impending doom. A wonderful way of racking up tension throughout the movie. Da-da-da… da-da-da… da-da-da…da-da-da… you know how it goes like...

4. SHADOWY BADDIES

What horror lurks in the shadows of our mind? What fresh madness awaits those who unlock doors where the unknown lurks? What our imagination can conjure up will always be more effective than anything shown on screen, so Carpenter's decision to leave Blake and co. in the shadows makes them more sinister than anything today’s CGI computer boffins could conceive. Would The Fog have been as effective if Blake was made up like that tentacle-faced fuckwit from Pirates of the Caribbean? No, of course it wouldn’t. Stop asking such stupid questions.

5. THE SHOCK ENDING
Carrie was made only a few short years earlier so I’m guessing that shock(!) endings were still very much in vogue when The Fog rolled in. And as much as I love it, the rationale behind it worries me. Because it means that the ghostly Blake must have changed his mind. He must have been walking back to his ship and then thought, “ Nah bollocks, I'm not going to let the priest away with it after all, hold up lads - I’ll go back and kill him.” Frankly, I can’t imagine an unworldy entity being so indecisive…

GREMLINS (1984)

Gremlins is the perfect Christmas Horror Movie, because it doesn't try too hard to be a Christmas Horror Movie. Santa Claus isn't the psycho, there are no killer snowmen. No - Christmas is just the time of the year in which the sheer bloody HORROR of Gremlins happens to take place.

Does anyone in this day and age need a review of Gremlins? If they do, then to be quite frank they're not the type of person I want reading this blog. So rather than write a review I've done a Top 5. Top 5's are more fun than reviews. Less thinking involved, so expect more from me in the future.

TOP 5 THINGS ABOUT GREMLINS

1. GIZMO - Nasty gremlins against a cute little furry thing? 9 times out of 10 I'd surely be on the gremlins side. Except Gizmo turns out to be more than a two dimensional cute character. He's a stand up guy. He's got attitude. He can handle himself despite being drop dead cute. A bit like a furry Robert Downey Jnr...

2. DICK MILLER - Dick Miller makes any film okay.

3. PHOEBE CATES - From personal experience, there are 2 types of women in the world - there are those who laugh in your face and walk off when you ask them out, and there are the ones who say "I'm really sorry, Igloo Keeper but I'm doing something else that night. And every other night." Phoebe is one of the latter. In fact, she'd probably even give me a sympathetic kiss on the cheek. Before she left me forever.

4. THE STAIR-LIFT SCENE - In all honesty this should be number 1 but I'm a bit too embarassed about how hilarious I still find it, God I'm not 14 years old anymore. When my son is old enough to watch this with me I'm going to try an tut disapprovingly all the way through.



5. KATE'S SANTA STORY - Every Comedy Horror needs a hint of genuine darkness. And here it is; "The worst thing that ever happened to me was on Christmas. Oh, God. It was so horrible. It was Christmas Eve. I was 9 years old. Me and Mom were decorating the tree, waiting for Dad to come home from work. A couple hours went by. Dad wasn't home. So Mom called the office. No answer. Christmas Day came and went, and still nothing. So the police began a search. Four or five days went by. Neither one of us could eat or sleep. Everything was falling apart. It was snowing outside. The house was freezing, so I went to try to light up the fire. That's when I noticed the smell. The firemen came and broke through the chimney top. And me and Mom were expecting them to pull out a dead cat or a bird. And instead they pulled out my father. He was dressed in a Santa Claus suit. He'd been climbing down the chimney... his arms loaded with presents. He was gonna surprise us. He slipped and broke his neck. He died instantly. And that's how I found out there was no Santa Claus."

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY!

Here's a mad Polish poster to enjoy:

MANIAC COP (1988)

We trust in cops to protect us, so the idea of one running amok is truly the stuff of nightmares and Horror movies. Unless you’re a regular on London Public Transport of course.

Maniac Cop hails from more innocent times – 1988 to be exact – and stars our favourite chin Bruce Campbell. Time hasn’t been to kind to Maniac Cop though, and it has the feel of a dated made-for-TV movie.

Great poster and memorable tagline though:



Sure, it's showing its age - aren't we all? But Maniac Cop has it has its moments if you’re a fan of the genre. And those moments, unsurprisingly, revolve around a maniac cop killing people in ways that only a maniac would, which obviously makes the general public a trifle uneasy.

But who is he, this Maniac Cop? Not Bruce Campbell, surely? Is Maniac Cop EVEN ALIVE??? And will he get to the mayor to exact his revenge? (spoiler: yes, he does) And will there be 2 sequels??? And are they worth watching? I haven’t seen them yet but I suspect they will be. Not good, but worth watching - so expect a review, perhaps even more in-depth than this one, in the not-too-distant future...

HELLBOUND: HELLRAISER 2 (1988)

Anyone else think the female Cenobite was quite sexy? Go on, admit it!

Anyway - Hellbound: Hellraiser 2 - Horror perfection! My God this is how to make a Horror sequel. Bigger, Better and Badder all round. There’s some seriously NASTAY stuff going on here.

Any dimwit that’s bought into the media ‘torture porn’ hype - about modern Horrors being worse than ever – need only watch some of the wonderfully revolting set-pieces in this film to realise ‘twas ever thus. You got madmen slashing themselves to ribbons, you got skinless people writhing around in pools of blood, you got babies sewing their own mouths shut, and there's blood spurting and pouring from, well just about everywhere, and skinless people finding skin again but then being skinned again and heads being drilled, injections being injected, YES - this is a VERY naughty film.

And it’s aged quite well. Thanks, I reckon, to the amazing costumes, set designs, and great music. There’s a touch of dodgy stop-motion near the end but give me dodgy stop-motion over dodgy CGI any day of the week.

And Pinhead’s not in it as much as you remember. But he’s not the real baddie of the piece anyway. Step forward Julia, the rotter! Played to perfection by Clare Higgins.
The story? Well there’s an asylum, a mute puzzle-solving girl, a mad doctor, Julia, a labyrinth, Uncle Frank, Leviathan, Cenobites, and lots of running around… you remember, don’t you? So do yourself a serious favour and pay this another visit... Why, it’ll tear your soul apart!!! Or make you go eewwww a few times, at least.

Chopping Mall (1986)

I was going to start by comparing Chopping Mall favourably to Robocop and Terminator, but my conscience won’t allow it. You know that Chopping Mall isn’t very good. And I know you know Chopping Mall isn’t very good. So let’s quit the bullshit (or B.S if you’re easily offended) and tell it like it is.

The good bits? Well, the robots are beautifully designed. They’ve got personality, honest! And an apparently keen sense of irony – why else would they say “Have a nice day” after blowing someone’s head off? These robots are good looking rascals, damn them.



And there’s some nice ‘Corman-esque’ humour running through the film. What exactly is ‘Corman-esque’ humour? Well, it’s quite hard for me to explain. It’s like, the kind of humour that is found in Roger Corman films. You’ll find it in this marvellous line half-way through Chopping Mall, “I'm just not used to be chased around a mall in the middle of the night by killer robots.” And therein lies the plot…

Some kids have an after hours party in the mall furniture store. The new-fangled robot security guards go a bit haywire after an electrical storm and well, they become a bit over-zealous.

The kids get some guns from the mall gun store and try and defend themselves. Badly. Whenever you see them firing their guns they appear to be either shooting the ground 2 feet in front of them or into the ceiling... then lots of running around ensues. At one stage I swear I saw the backgroung scenery repeating itself, just like the chase scenes in Scooby Doo.

It ends with a big satisfying explosion. But who will survive and what will become of them? That, my friend,would be telling... {laughs manically} {starts coughing}. Sorry.

JOHN CARPENTER'S PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1987)

I caught this on TV last night. For some reason this film had slipped under my radar until now. I think I might have half-heartedly dismissed it as a Dracula film some time ago…

But it’s not. It’s a John Carpenter film and not a very good one. If I could be arsed I’d spend a couple of paragraphs talking about when and how John Carpenter lost it. And when. And why? Perhaps it’s just, as Sickboy’s theory in Trainspotting goes, we all get old and then we can’t hack it anymore. Apart from old Blues musicians. And Helen Mirren.

And so to the film. Donald Pleasence is in it, which is good. He’s a priest who discovers a huge canister with some green 80’s special effects glowing inside. This isn’t a good thing. In fact, it’s the devil!

DISCLAIMER – OR IS IT THE DEVIL? I'M NOT TOO SURE. TO BE HONEST A LOT OF THIS FILM CONFUSED ME. WHAT IT WAS DOING THERE AND WHY IT WAS ABLE TO DO WHAT IT DID AND… WELL, MAJOR PARTS OF THE PLOT LIKE THAT. MAYBE IT WAS ME, IT WAS LATE AS I SAID, BUT…

…anyway, the priest calls in some sub-atomic-or-something scientists and students to set up home in the church, install lots of their equipment and analyse the devil-canister and translate old scripts and all that sort of stuff. Some spooky homeless people, led by Alice Cooper, stare at the church from the pavement (or ‘sidewalk’).


The rest of the film relies on people wandering off on their own, nobody checking on them, nobody deciding to guard the devil-canister, nobody calling the police to remove the staring hobos outside, nobody – including me – apparently knowing what the hell is going on.

The film ends with three different groups of people split up from each other, watching and waiting while the possessed parts of the group do some stuff, again for reasons I can’t explain – why does one woman appear to be pregnant? Why is the large black guy laughing and crying and staring at a mirror? Why are two of the girls standing outside the Chinese guy in the closet? (He’s gay, but there’s no time for me to make a pun).

The film ends, mercifully, when one of the possessed tries to pull the devil through a mirror (or maybe not the devil. If the devil’s in the canister. Oh, I dunno) and one of the good non-possessed girls rushes at her and they both fall through the mirror, which Donald Pleasence smashes. Game Over.

Then there’s a jump-fright ending where the hero wakes up and something horrible’s next to him. He goes over to touch his mirror… credits roll.

THE END

Right, now I’m going over to IMDB to find out what was going on, then I’ll come back, change all this to make myself look more intelligent. See you soon!