I've seen loads of movies since my last tab so I'll try and keep these brief...
Savage Streets (Danny Steinmann, 1984)
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It's a shame you're not double jointed, because you wont be able to bend over and kiss your ass goodbye before I kill you.
Exorcist star Linda Blair goes postal after her deaf sister (played by scream queen Linnea Quigley) is gang raped, and her best friend murdered by a vicious street gang (who all dress like they just got back from a Billy Idol concert). Cue an incredibly hammy melange of
Death Wish and
Class of 1984 as Blair camps it up in Razzie award winning style. Slow and cliched;
Savage Streets takes an age to get to the revenge fuelled action, but Blair is so gleefully over the top, that it remains highly watchable. I really enjoyed this one and recommend it to anyone who likes vigilante movies and 80's cheese. Plus If you want to see Linda Blair naked in the bath then this is definitely the film for you.
Macabre (Lamberto Bava, 1980)
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Bernice Stegers gives a seductively manic performance as a housewife who loses her husband in a car crash and proceeds to keep his rotting severed head in the fridge so she can make love to it. Her blind landlord's suspicions are are soon aroused along with her estranged (and decidedly evil) daughter who begin to hear her 'noises' at night. Underrated film from Lamberto Bava is a complex slow burner which cleverly plays on themes of sexual repression, incest, and necrophilia with often blackly comic results. Some say this is uneventful and boring, but I found Stegers' performance, and the complex relationships on offer ample compensation for the lethargic pacing.
Hard Times (Walter Hill, 1975)
Wonderful period action film from Hill with Charles Bronson perfectly cast as Chaney; a strong silent type who drifts into depression era New Orleans looking to make some fast money on the street fighting circuit. Ready to take advantage is Speed (James Coburn) a fast talking promoter with a gambling habit. This is highly entertaining stuff, with an authentic period feel, perfect pacing and likable three dimensional characters. The fight scenes are fantastic and the story involving. I'll be looking to pick this up on dvd. Highly recommended
Sole Survivor (Thom Eberhardt, 1983)
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TV producer Denise (Anita Skinner) is the sole survivor of a plane crash but gets stalked by eerie figures who appear to want her dead. Throw into the mix a concerned doctor-come-lover, and a psychic friend who warned her not to take the flight, and you have an intriguing mixture of
Carnival of Souls and
Final Destination. Despite the interesting premise, Eberhardt's treatment is sadly a little plodding, and the editing (especially at the beginning of the movie) is somewhat confusing. On the plus side it's well acted, with some well crafted suspense sequences and a satisfyingly downbeat ending. Worth a look.
The Witch Who Came from the Sea (Matt Cimber, 1976)
Genuine oddity with Millie Perkins (who reminded me a lot of Miranda July) excellent as an ethereal kook with a murderous vendetta against good looking men. Sporting incredibly eccentric dialogue, dreamlike flashback sequences and an all round air of the strange; this often confusing film ties everything together with a disturbing final revelation, but takes an age to get there, and feels very pretentious. Still, I liked the weird seaside atmosphere, crazy dialogue, and arthouse/exploitation aesthetic. A genuine, if rather unsatisfying original.
All the Colors of the Dark (Sergio Martino, 1972)
A big improvement on the lackluster
Torso; Martino's heady mixture of giallo and horror plays like a cross between
Rosemary's Baby and Lucio Fulci's
A Lizard in a Woman's Skin. Beautiful giallo regular Edwige Fenech plays a young woman recovering from a car accident (in which she lost her unborn child) who believes she's being inducted into a murderous satanic cult. There's a sinister blue eyed man stalking her with seemingly malicious intent, and she's frequently plagued by psychedelic visions of her mother's murder (or is it her own?). At first everyone (including her love interest played by fellow giallo regular George Hilton) thinks she's losing the plot confusing fantasy with reality. But then people start turning up dead, and elements of her 'episodes' begin to manifest themselves physically. With much better pacing, and a decent central performance from Fenech, I found
All the Colors of the Dark to be lots of fun. Especially impressive is Marino's use of colour saturated lighting and dramatic shadows often reminiscent of Mario Bava. The suspense, particularly a sequence involving an elevator, is handled effectively, and there's the usual helping of glamorous female flesh on offer. Good fun.
The Case of the Scorpion's Tail (Sergio Martino, 1971)
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Lisa Baumer (Ida Galli) stands to inherit one million dollars after her husband is blown up on a plane. Off she goes to Greece to collect her fortune, but is pursued by Peter Lynch (George Hilton again); an investigator for the insurance company who think she may have something to do with her husband's death. Soon however, there's a murderer on the loose with a penchant for knives and fishing gear. Enter into the fray French photojournalist Cleo (Anita Strindberg), and various law enforcement officials, as true to style, things become decidedly convoluted and bloody. I found this to be a derivative, but entertaining giallo, with stylistic nods to Argento's
The Bird With the Crystal Plumage (the killer's choice of outfits) and Hitchcock's
Psycho (the first of the film's dramatic plot twists). Whist there's nothing really remarkable about the film, it
does make sense, the murders are very gruesome, there's an energetic jazzy score from Bruno Nicolai, and Strindberg looks suitably glamorous. I loved it, but this is really only for genre fans.
Bad Ronald (Buzz Kulick, 1974 TV)
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Scott Jacoby is Ronald; a bullied mommy's boy and loner who lives in his own fantasy world of elves and goblins. After he accidentally kills one of his tormentors (a young girl); he panics and buries the body which is subsequently discovered by the police. Fearful he can no longer claim it was an accident; his mother (the wonderful Kim Hunter) decides to wall up a room in the house and hide him. Their plan works until Ronald's mother dies suddenly, leaving him alone in his hideaway as a new family moves in. Whilst the production values never rise above TV movie trappings, the story is very involving, and Jacoby is excellent as the well meaning Ronald, doomed to insanity. I didn't really find this scary (or credible - why didn't anyone spot that a large room was walled up?); but with such a great story, and at a mere 74 minutes this proved to be an entertaining distraction. It reminded me a lot of shows like
The Twilight Zone, and
Tales of the Unexpected which is a good thing.
What Have They Done to Your Daughters? / Don't Ask the Police for Help (Massimo Dallamano, 1974)
Dallamano's follow up (not sequel) to his celebrated giallo
What Have You Done to Solange? is a complete change of pace. Instead of the lethargic stately pacing of
Solange;
Daughters is more of a fast paced (yet talky) Poliziotteschi with giallo undertones. Police investigate the suicide of a young girl and uncover evidence of a teenage prostitution ring. In the meantime a crash helmet wearing killer proceeds to bump off everyone connected to the case with a meat cleaver. It's just as sleazy as it sounds with police and political corruption all figuring in the subsequent mayhem which badly lacks a sense of humour.
Daughters is well made enough with a nice minimalist score from Stelvio Cipriani, and some decent chase sequences involving said biker, but the grim tone grates when compared to similar offerings.
Frightmare (Pete Walker, 1974)
Sheila Keith is wonderfully deranged as a supposedly 'cured' cannibal who, along with her husband (Rupert Davies), has been released from a mental institution after fifteen years. Soon her daughter from a previous marriage Jackie (Deborah Fairfax) suspects she's up to her old tricks again, and enlists the help of her psychiatrist boyfriend (Paul Greenwood) to investigate. Proving a further hindrance is Jackie's unruly sister Debbie (Kim Butcher) who's been involved in a murder, and may know more about their mother than she's letting on. Well written tale, is superbly played by all ensemble, but Keith is sensationally creepy as the cannibalistic mother who just can't help herself. Clearly made on the cheap, Walker does an excellent job of cranking up the tension culminating with the inevitable bloodbath and family revelations. Very much of it's time stylistically, though the plot could have been written yesterday;
Frightmare is an excellent horror film that pretty much ticked all my boxes.
Body Double (Brian De Palma, 1984)
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Giallo American style with De Palma back in
Dressed to Kill mode with the usual nods to Hitchcock (
Rear Window) and Argento (
Tenebre). Here Craig Wasson plays a dim witted struggling actor with claustrophobia who witnesses a murder after using a telescope to spy on an attractive neighbour (Deborah Shelton). Soon he's hooking up with porn star Holly Body (the lovely Melanie Griffith on top form) who may know the identity of the killer. Delightfully trashy and sleazy; this has the usual blend of elaborately staged set pieces, punctuated by one gory killing and a somewhat predictable ending. Very eighties and very watchable, I enjoyed this immensely; though it's not in the same league as
Dressed to Kill.
Other stuff I watched...
Return of Sister Street Fighter (Shigehiro Ozawa, 1974)
A distinct step down; this third installment uses exactly the same plot
again, whilst forgoing the gore and excitement of previous entries.
Sister Street Fighter: Fifth Level Fist (Shigehiro Ozawa, 1976)
Completely unrelated film has Shihomi playing a different character who also has rotten luck when it come to family members getting bumped off. Pretty forgettable.
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). The triple zoom cut in the alleyway stalking also seemed a bit desperate - and again the scene itself didn't seem to have the tension i remember being in original, altho was fine in its own right.
