DVD Reviews

Because the power of Juliet Mills compels yyyyoooooouuuu!!! The pea soup as vomit spews again in 1974’s Beyond the Door.  Written and directed by Ovidio Assonitis and Robert Barrett, the horror flick about a pregnant woman is an obvious Rosemary’s Baby knockoff, but  ...

This is the type of independent horror film where few got paid.  It's fun and tedious and is worth remembering solely for the kill scenes and the fresh-looking gore effects.  You see, that's what happens when a film gets made and then re-made again.  It barely makes sense, but does ...

Donald “Donny” Kohler (Dan Grimaldi) might be a bit touched in the head, but he has a fantastic collection of life-sized adult dolls.  They are nude, attractive, and, much like a fine brisket, a bit crispy on the outer skin.  Blackened to perfection by the flamethrower he’s swiped ...

When the knife used in the film’s first murder is described by the detectives in charge as “real big and real sharp”, you know you’re in for one sweet ride.  Silent Scream is exactly that.  Directed by Denny Harris and set alongside the Pacific Ocean, this slasher functions as a ...

If invisible tiger attacks and real surgical footage are both right up your alley, then Arrow Video has a super rare treat for you with their release of the B-movie glory hole that is Wolf Guy. Spirit Tigers, Werewolves, and Kung-Fu, oh my! ...

Rats. Why’d it have to be rats. Willard Stiles.  Now, there’s a character for horror fans to discuss and nibble over.  Portrayed by Bruce Davison, this socially inept character is ridiculously  ...

“Where Willard ended, Ben begins,” is the promise on the original poster for the quick sequel to the unexpected hit that was Willard.  Unfortunately, Ben was doomed the minute Willard ended. No matter which way you look at it, Ben, the sequel to Willard, is just not a very good ...

Keep that foot on the gas. Apparently, Vin Diesel has enough machismo left in the tank to take lead position in yet another revved-up and frenetic franchise. Xander Cage, extreme sports hero and sometimes government spy (last seen in 2002), has returned to motorcycle surf  ...

Voodoo Black Exorcist is something else, man.  If it sounds like it could be a rip-off to you, then your bullshit meter is working; there’s no need for a tune-up.  The curious thing about this title is exactly WHAT movie it is recreating and WHERE it is.  If you guessed ...

The late Bill Paxton certainly had an interesting career in movies.  From Weird Science to Aliens and beyond, the characters he played were almost always left or right of center.  He was a damn good character actor and, as made clear by the horror and hysterics of The Vagrant ...

Confession time, Boils and Ghouls!  I grew up  - even as fat as I was – wanting to be Michael Paré’s cool as a cucumber Tom Cody from Streets of Fire.  Most my age wanted to be cracking shit with a bullwhip and making off, just like Indiana Jones,  with golden idols and ...

“Come into my head.  Come into my head.  COME INTO MY HEAD,” is the hypnotizing command from the crispy mouth of Lanyard Gates, who killed his family and set fire to his own theater.  It is a beckoning for aspiring film writer Maggie Butler (Jill Schoelen) and a challenge ...

Get that jar of Johnson’s Afro Sheen ready, brothers and sisters!  The blowout kit will be needed in order to survive this freakishly tall tale of laser beam fusion and wonky genetic theories. Blackenstein, courtesy of Severin Film, is back on the creep (oh ah, oh ah, ...

Believe it or not, the very first time actors Vincent Price, Christopher Lee, and Peter Cushing were in the same film together was in 1970 with Scream and Scream Again.  While only two of the three horror icons share screen time together, their appearance in this weird title ...

“Honey, look! I made a killing,” exclaims Beverly Sutphin as she marches hurriedly back to her daughter’s booth with a black fire poker in her hand.  She’s as clueless as she is psychotic and the hilariously long line of cop cars that follows her on the way to church is proof enough ...

Do I dare say it?  Do I dare suggest such blasphemy?  I do.  In my opinion, we’ve just witnessed the next evolution of horror with the release of The Void.  It is a film that matches, frame for frame, the otherworldly bizarreness and esoteric terror of Clive Barker’s Hellraiser ...

Director John Brahm knows how to create mood.  I praised his efforts in my reviews for The Lodger and The Undying Monster, but with Vincent Price in 1954’s The Mad Magician, he adds a new dimension to terror.  By mixing the 3D technology of the time period with shockingly ...

If you’ve read my article Five Beers: In Defense of the Trashier Side of Cinema, then you probably realize a documentary about the rise and fall of physical media is going to be close to my heart.  This is the territory of VHS Massacre: Cult Films and the Decline ...

I’m just going to go ahead and say (and spray) it everywhere.  Exploitation filmmaker Frank Henenlotter is one of the few remaining mad geniuses of the cinema; he’s a walking masterpiece of the b-movie.  Horror Hounds and Gore-Gore girls, this is what happens when  ...

Looking for a quick study of the attitude and overall swagger of the 1980s?  Few things are as tonally expressive AND summative as the opening few minutes of this flick when it comes to the 1980s heyday.  Look no further ...

I bet you probably didn’t know that Darth Vader made an appearance in another film shortly after the release of Return of the Jedi.  I also bet you didn’t know that a fat kid’s biggest fear is to be eaten by a double cheeseburger.  It’s all true.  Making Contact, an Amblin ...

While Bela Lugosi’s residency making poverty row pictures was relatively short-lived, there were a handful of solid horror titles he made that originally went ignored.  The Corpse Vanishes, doubling down on the genuine weirdness of an aging couple obsessed with  ...

It’s time to go back; back to the 1980’s.  It was a time when the videocassette ruled everything.  The sticker advising us to “Be Kind, Rewind” was stuck to every case.  Sometimes, we did and other times, well, we were kind of in a hurry to get the damn thing back to the video ...

Nail guns and cyborgs are always a deadly combination.  Ouch. Toward the end of the 1990s, there were a slew of disaster pictures concerning everything from the end of the freakin’ world to computers losing their shit.  It seemed that everyone wanted to weigh in on Y2K.  Off-screen ...

It was the first movie I ever saw in 3-D.  Friggin’ SpaceVision as I recall.  For that reason and others (involving the sheer joy of the flick), I freakin’ love director Lamont Johnson’s Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone.  LOVE IT.  To me, it is Canuxploitation ...

Burn, baby, burn! Cannon Films, man.  What a run they had.  From American Ninja to Delta Force and beyond, for many a teenager growing up in the 1970s and the 1980s, they were the source for high-flying action.  I mean, who doesn’t love Stallone taking names and ...

"I love this game, Moonpie.  I love it." A dark arena fills the picture.  Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor fills our ears as two teams enter the rink.  The teams are Houston and Madrid and the game they are about to play is called Rollerball, a violent sport centered ...

To this day, there remains something insanely special about director Brian De Palma’s Carrie.  It is based on the once-discarded novel by Stephen King, but was painstakingly adapted for the screen by Lawrence D. Cohen.  Cohen got everything about King’s first novel right  ...

A Tree of Terror!  Americans in peril!  Radioactive typhoons!  Jungle Witchcraft!  From Hell It Came promises and delivers a total atomic age … bomb.  No wonder then that this film was the last monster picture to be created by the Milner Bros.  There’s no coming back from ...

For the longest time, the Halloween franchise has been “the toppermost of the poppermost” for me.  Nothing was more frightening than the bogeyman that Michael Myers was made to be.  Well, that was then and people, as they are wont to do, can change their minds ...